Gambia Revenue Authority and SICPA Sign Revenue Agreement

The Gambia’s Ministry of Finance and Economic Affairs, in partnership with the Gambia Revenue Authority (GRA), has signed a concession agreement with SICPA for the implementation of a revenue mobilisation platform for excisable goods, telecommunication services, and refined fuels.

The agreement forms part of the GRA’s reform priorities for 2020-2024.

Speaking shortly after the agreement signing ceremony, the Minister of Finance, Seedy Keita said: ‘the full implementation of this solution will give GRA, among other things, access to accurate real-time or near real-time production data of locally produced excisable goods; differentiate between illicit and genuinely imported excisable goods; provide revenue assurance on taxes and levies being collected from telecom services; and distinguish genuinely imported fuel products from illicit fuel through fuel marking.’ 

©: The Voice Gambia.

He added that the government would put in place the necessary laws and regulations to facilitate the smooth implementation of the solution.

According to GRA Commissioner General Yankuba Darboe: ‘the benefits of this solution touch all actors of the economy.

‘For producers, it helps monitor their market share as it serves as a major deterrent to smuggling and dumping of substandard products, thus encouraging fair competition, while for consumers it will ensure quality assurances as all products consumed within the country will be tested for quality and validity through a digital tax stamp.’ 

On the side of the government, he explained that the agreement would combat tax evasion and further inform the government on the size of the economy, through improved data quality and enhanced visibility of economic activities in the telecoms and manufacturing industries.

Gambia is one of the more than 20 African countries that are party to the WHO FCTC Protocol to Eliminate Illicit Trade in Tobacco Products. Under the terms of the Protocol, these countries are obliged to implement secure track and trace systems on tobacco products, with most of them having until September 2023 to do so.

Along with Gambia, a good number of parties (including Cape Verde, Chad, Comoros, Eswatini, Gabon, Guinea, Madagascar, Mali, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal, and Seychelles) still don’t have secure track and trace systems in place – at least, not as far as this newsletter is aware.

Therefore it is good to know that Gambia, at least, is moving ahead with implementing such a system – and not only on tobacco products.