South Sudan: Government plans to boost collection of none-oil revenue

Minister of Cabinet Affairs, Martin Elia Lomuro (File photo)

The government of South Sudan said on Friday that it is working to double the collection of non oil revenue by 380 percent in the next five years.

Addressing journalists after the cabinet meeting, Martin Elia Lomuro, the Minister of Cabinet Affairs, said the National Revenue Authority has developed a strategic document that will improve the collection of non oil revenues.

“The revenue authority is faced with many challenges; it is not able to collect enough money for us to be able to run the government, so we have had that strategic plan for five years, 2022 to 2027,” he said.

“The plan has a number of key strategic objectives, eleven of them. It has 42 implementation metrics, and the aim is to increase collection from the 80 billion that we are collecting now to 367 billion over five years; that is a 380 percent increase,” Lomuro stated.

The cabinet also said the government is working to develop close economic and development ties with the United Arab Emirates to spur economic prosperity.

Lomuro said the two countries signed several bilateral agreements that will allow companies from UAE to South Sudan to invest in a number of areas.

“Bilateral relationship that was reached between the United Arab Emirates (UAE) on a number of development issues, on agriculture, mining, roads, which affects different entities. Traders, business communities, and some of the business communities have signed an agreement on mining, and there are agricultural companies the president has already met with chiefs to allocate land for agriculture,” Elia said.

 Lomuro reiterated that the ministry of justice is developing a document that will help in limiting tax avoidance by the investing companies.