The Electronic Transaction Levy (E-levy), a 1.5% tax on all electronic transactions, went into effect on the 1st of May amongst considerable uncertainty and controversy. One of the prime justifications for the levy was to capture the informal sector. The President of Ghana, Nana Akufo-Addo, defended the levy as an important measure to expand the…
In 2018, the International Centre for Tax and Development (ICTD) published findings from a research study in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. While the researchers did not find any evidence of gender bias in the way market traders were taxed, they did find a major gender issue they did not expect – toilet fees. They found…
About two years ago, the ICTD began a new research program on gender and taxation with the support of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Following a workshop with our African stakeholders in Ghana, we decided to pursue two main areas of enquiry 1) the representation of women in African tax administrations, and the impacts…
What does tax justice mean at the local level, and how can the experiences of informal market traders be linked with broader international campaigns? This blog draws out insights from ActionAid’s experience of incorporating the demands of market traders in Nigeria into its international tax justice campaign.
For the past twenty years, Maama Sula (let’s say) has run a small fast-food restaurant in a town called Wandegeya in Kampala, Uganda. She sources the bulk of her supplies from the women in the nearby market. Because her business is relatively well-established, she pays income taxes and Value Added Tax (VAT) to the central…
