Zimbabwe surpassed its revenue target for the first half of 2017 by 9.74 percent after net collections stood at 1.701 billion U.S. dollars against 1.550 billion dollars collected during the same period last year.
Gross collections for the period under review stood at 1.789 billion dollars, 8.05 percent above target, the Zimbabwe Revenue Authority (ZIMRA) said Thursday.
“Company tax, valued added tax on imports, mining royalties, dividends, fees, interest remittances and other indirect taxes surpassed their set targets for the first half of 2017,” ZIMRA said.
ZIMRA attributed the positive performance to revenue enhancement measures it is implementing such as automation, audits and anti-corruption initiatives.
Board chairperson Willia Bonyongwe said the tax agency was upping its fight against tax corruption, pointing out that during the period, the anti-corruption hotline received 394 reports, out of which 218 were fully investigated while the remaining cases were still under different stages of investigation.
“The investigations yielded about 120 million dollars in assessments,” Bonyongwe said.
She called for more measures to increase tax compliance, noting that “most traders in the central business district and major shopping centers are yet to comply.”
Bonyongwe said Zimbabwe could easily collect 6 billion dollars in revenue annually if everyone was tax compliant.
She said tax debt increased by 16.85 percent during the first half from 2.76 billion dollars in January to 3.12 billion dollars as at June 30, as companies struggle to survive in the difficult economic environment.
Zimbabwe’s projected revenue target for 2017 is 3.4 billion dollars against an expenditure of 3.7 billion dollars.
