UN Headquarters, New York

The Financing for Development Office (FfDO) of UN-DESA organized, in cooperation with the OECD Center for Tax Policy and Administration (CTPA) a workshop on “Tax Base Protection for Developing Countries” with the participation of representatives of developing countries.

This meeting was part of a project, undertaken by FfDO, focused on strengthening the capacity of developing countries to increase their potential for domestic revenue mobilization through enhancing their ability to effectively protect and broaden their tax base. The work of the project covers a number of topics of particular interest and relevance to developing countries, at their stage of capacity development, with a view to supporting them in assessing, from their own perspective, a range of practical and workable options which could be implemented by these countries, resulting in increased tax revenues. The project draws upon and contributes to the work of the UN Committee of Experts on International Cooperation in Tax Matters and its relevant Subcommittees, including the Subcommittee on Base Erosion and Profit Shifting (BEPS), as well as the work of the OECD project on BEPS, as appropriate, with a view to complementing that work from a capacity development angle. The final outcome of the project will be a UN handbook, comprising a collection of papers developed in a novel demand-driven manner taking into account inputs from developing countries.

This workshop provided a broad overview and update on the UN and OECD work in this area and then focused on the following topics: (1) Preventing tax treaty abuse; (2) Taxation of services (including taxation of fees for technical services); (3) Protecting the tax base in the digital economy; and (4) Tax incentives and tax base protection issues.

Participants in this meeting were also invited to participate in the Special meeting of ECOSOC on international cooperation in tax matters (5 June 2014, New York).