The taxation of informal economies is one of the key challenges for tax professionals and policymakers in Africa. Across a range of country contexts, current methods are often disappointing from a revenue standpoint and can have sensitive equity implications. At the same time, pressures on revenue authorities to collect more taxes from unregistered firms are substantial.

Over the past few years, the International Centre for Tax and Development (ICTD) has conducted research and policy dialogues on taxation and informal economies in Africa. We believe that now is a critical time to have a new conversation on the topic, bringing together both researchers and key stakeholders for a dedicated retreat. 

In collaboration with the African Tax Administration Forum (ATAF) and Women in Informal Employment: Globalising and Organising (WIEGO), ICTD will be hosting a focused workshop in Akosombo, Ghana from 18th to 21st February 2024 that seeks to chart new ways forward in how revenue authorities engage with informal economies.

Format

The workshop will include both presentations on current research and policy practice and extensive breakout groups that focus on learning between revenue authorities as well as mapping out promising areas of policy development and best practice. Key themes will be tax registration, presumptive taxation, targeting and equity implications and working with informal workers. The participants include research and civil society organisations alongside representatives from over a dozen revenue authorities.  

While the workshop will be held under the Chatham House rule in order to ensure confidential and constructive conversations, we will publish key findings alongside blogs from participants on this website in the coming weeks.

Ongoing work

On top of long-standing partnerships with revenue authorities, WIEGO, and ATAF, the workshop also draws on ICTD research on tax and informality in the past few years. See below for two recent outputs with some of our key partners for the workshop:

Event Details
Date
18 February 2025 - 21 February 2025
Time
-
Location
Akosombo
Ghana

Max Gallien

Max Gallien is a Research Fellow at the ICTD. His research specialises in the politics of informal and illegal economies, the political economy of the Middle East and North Africa and development politics. He completed his PhD at the London School of Economics. Max co-leads the informality and taxation programme with Vanessa, as well as the ICTD’s capacity building programme.

Vanessa van den Boogaard

Vanessa van den Boogaard is a Research Fellow at the ICTD and a Senior Research Associate at the Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy at the University of Toronto. She completed her PhD thesis on informal revenue generation and statebuilding in Sierra Leone, and has ongoing research on the topic in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Somalia. Vanessa leads the ICTD’s new programme on civil society engagement in tax reform and co-leads the research programme on informal taxation.

Mary Abounabhan

Mary Abounabhan is a Research Officer for the DIGITAX programme. Her research focuses on the the appropriateness and effectiveness of digital financial services taxes and their development impacts. She has completed her Masters of Globalisation, Business, and Development at the Institute of Development Studies, focusing her research on the Moral Economy of social media taxation in Lebanon.