BAKU, Azerbaijan, Sept. 5
By Nargiz Sadikhova - Trend:
Kazakhstan will update its plan to counter the shadow economy in the country, Kazakhstan’s First Deputy Prime Minister, Alikhan Smailov said, Trend reports with reference to the press office of Kazakhstan’s prime minister.
Smailov made the statement during a press briefing on the topic of pursuance of the President's instructions.
Thus, the legislation will be improved in terms of money transfers to offshore jurisdictions. The first exchange of information on the financial accounts of individuals and legal entities between the tax authorities of the OECD countries is to be carried out before the end of this year. In this regard, an analysis of the information received on the residents of our country will be carried out.
The work on the digitalization of tax and customs administration will also be intensified and continued. Starting October 1, labeling of tobacco products is to be introduced. The list of goods subject to labeling will be constantly expanding, which will significantly reduce the shadow turnover in the economy, especially in trade.
To date, a draft law "On procurement of individual subjects of the quasi-public sector" has been developed. Its adoption and transfer of all procedures to an electronic format will increase the transparency and openness of procurement.
Furthermore, a “Single window for purchases’ portal was created at Kazakhstan’s Atameken Chamber of Entrepreneurship based on various existing purchasing sites.
“Systematic work to reduce the shadow economy is being carried out, the volume of which is gradually decreasing. If experts assessed the shadow economy to equal 40 percent to GDP previously, now the shadow economy is assessed to equal 23.7 percent of GDP,” Smailov explained.
In his words, the government is already implementing comprehensive measures to reduce the shadow economy under the adopted plan, which provides for measures aimed at automation and digitalization of tax and customs administration; development of cashless payments; anti-money laundering; improvement of legislation.
Within the framework of digitalization of tax and customs administration, the National System of Traceability of Goods, which is a complex of information systems, was created.
“All this helps to increase budget revenues and reduce shadow turnover in the economy. The budget received 1.5 trillion tenges ($3.5 billion) more income in 2020 than in the previous year. Of these, 920 billion tenges ($2.1 billion) were received due to improvement of tax and customs administration and digitalization in this area,” Smailov said.
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