By Naa Shormei Odonkor
Kumasi, May 31, GNA – Mr. Benaiah Nii Addo, the Executive Director for the Green Tax Youth Africa, Accra, has said taxation can serve as an effective tool for influencing and transforming negative behaviours of citizens.
He was speaking on Progressive Taxation at a two-day training on Illicit Financial Flows (IFFs) and Progressive Taxation for selected Ghanaian journalists in Kumasi.
The training, organized by the Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA), seeks to build the capacity of 80 journalists in four regions to effectively produce and report stories on IFFs.
The target is to train 20 journalist each in the Ashanti, Eastern, Northern and Volta regions.
Mr. Addo explained that by increasing taxes on harmful goods such as alcohol, tobacco, cigarettes, and high concentrated sugar foods, the government could effectively drive-up prices and reduce consumption among targeted groups.
This strategy, he noted, falls under the “Five Rs” of Taxation: Revenue, Representation, Redistribution, Re-pricing and Regulation.
Beyond influencing consumer behaviour, Mr. Addo noted that taxes remained the most stable and reliable source of domestic revenue available to countries.
Therefore, it is the mandate of government to ensure a fair and equitable tax system where wealthier citizens contribute more, while vulnerable, low-income communities were protected from disproportionate tax burdens.
He emphasized the importance of progressive taxation where tax rates increase with income levels in financing sustainable development.
This, he argued, was better than regressive taxation which burdened the pro-poor and the marginalized in the country.
Mr. Addo noted that 80 per cent of individuals outside the tax bracket were in the informal sector, while 20 per cent fell within the tax bracket and that 7.9 million people had registered to pay taxes.
However, he observed that only 1.58 million people were actively paying taxes in the country as of 2023/2024, adding that it placed more burden on the formal sector.
Mr. Addo noted that the tax implementation in the country remained weak, citing inadequate structures and capacity support to enhance tax administration and enforcement.
He appealed to the government to lean more on progressive taxation to ease the tax burden on the pro-poor and the marginalized.
GNA
Edited By Yussif Ibrahim/Christian Akorlie