Ahead of the 2019 mid-year budget review presentation later this morning, some private individuals and institutions have added their voice, to calls for some major reforms.
The presentation of the supplementary budget by the Finance Minister, Ken Ofori-Attah, comes 8 months after the presentation of the main 2019 budget in November last year.
Speaking to Citi Business News about the expectations of industry, the CEO of the Association of Ghana Industries Seth Twum Akwaboah, said a review of some tax measures like the decoupling of the GETFund and NHIL Levy from VAT, will go a long way to make industry more competitive.
“We’ve had a few concerns that we would want dealt with, one of them being the newly introduced benchmark value policy, there’s also the issue of the decoupling of the GETFund and NHIL Levy from VAT. It’s negatively affecting the competitiveness of companies in the country.”
On his part the Executive Director of the Ghana Integrity Initiative (GII) and the Chairman of the Tax Justice Coalition Ghana Vitus Azeem said he was afraid Government will not be able to introduce much needed tax reforms to raise revenue due to fears over election 2020.
“Because we are approaching an election year, the government may not be bold enough to insist on some of the taxes they would have put in place. With the pressure on the luxury vehicle tax for example they are likely to either reduce it or remove it entirely.”
For the agriculture sector the 2009 National best farmer Davies Korboe called for the establishment of an Agriculture fund that will help farmers across the country secure affordable credit.
“Anybody in the Agriculture space wants to see an Agriculture Development Fund. This fund will allow people in the Agriculture value chain to access credit with interest rates like 10 to 12 percent. If the hard working famers of Ghana get such support they will do wonders.”