Double taxation issues discussed

Newly appointed Finance Minister Kakha Baindurashvili has held a special meeting dedicated to double taxation issues. Georgia has signed an agreement to avoid double taxation with certain countries, thereby creating a more friendly climate for export and import operations. Unfortunately however due to bureaucratic formalities the double taxation law is not properly observed in the tax section of the Ministry of Finance itself.

In the autumn of 2006 then Minister of Finance Lekso Aleksishvili introduced a special form to make it easier for import-export businesses to settle taxation problems with the appropriate bodies. However the forms were not arranged properly, there were many discrepancies, they were difficult to fill in, many items contradicted each other and so on. Rather than encourage import-export the forms created obstacles, and there were cases when the Finance Ministry and customs and tax officials themselves could not fill in the forms properly.

Representatives of forwarders, expert-import companies, railways, consulting companies and so on gave Baindurashvili different examples from their everyday work which demonstrated that radical changes need to be made to help business. The Minister listened attentively and agreed with almost all the points raised by the businessmen. He also promised that in a couple of weeks he will introduce some recommendations which will be disseminated to the business community for comment. Any additional recommendations will also be considered. The Minister expressed his wish to further cooperate with business representatives to contribute to the development of business activities in the country.