In the media
Findings from recent research based on Ugandan administrative tax data gather visibility in the local media

The workshop, organised by the Uganda Revenue Authority (URA) and UNU-WIDER, presented the findings of research papers taking advantage of the URA firm panel, a dataset constructed from administrative corporate income tax (CIT) returns and firm registration data. The dataset can only be found at the URA secure research lab, launched in 2022 along with a call for papers.

Two WIDER Working Papers were presented at the event:

• Musoke et al.: Did Uganda’s corporate tax incentives benefit the Ugandan economy or only the firms?
• Vincent et al.: Compliance rates with local and national business taxes. Evidence from Kampala, Uganda

Both of the topics were highlighted in local newspapers, radio and tv:

• URA reports over sh160 billion in losses due to tax incentives (Daily Express)
• Over UGX 160B lost in incentives - URA report (URN)
• Tax holidays wipe out Shs160b in corporate tax (Daily Monitor)
• Shs160b lost annually in tax breaks, says URA (Daily Monitor)
• Business entities with tax incentives (KFM radio)
• KCCA lost over 10 billion shillings in non-tax compliance (KFM radio)
• URA bothered by tax evasion among companies (Dembe FM, in Lugandan language)
• URA express concern towards the failure of firms with tax holidays to benefit the country economically (Sanyu FM, in Lugandan language)
• URA express concern over non-tax compliance by companies (Sanyu FM, in Lugandan language)
• Billions are lost in tax incentives which are not fully accounted for as beneficiary firms fail to file for tax returns (NTV)

The event was part of the collaboration under the Building up efficient and fair tax systems – lessons based on administrative tax data project, which is part of UNU-WIDER's research and capacity development programme on domestic revenue mobilization (DRM), funded by the Norwegian Agency for Development Co-operation (Norad).