Led by His Excellency the Minister Max Tonela, the PAE team met on 12/02/2022 with s. Excia Minister of Industry and Commerce, Silvino Augusto José Moreno, for an update on topics related to the business environment and advances in the actions of the Economy Acceleration Program. The meeting was intended to assess the status of the actions envisaged in measure 8 related to export inspection and measure 15 linked to the simplification of processes in the relationship between companies and the state.
Regarding measure 8, actions were discussed to combat tax evasion caused by under-invoicing both in exports and imports.
In the case of exports, the issue is highly relevant because when the exporter declares export prices lower than the actual sales prices of the products abroad, the tax burden collected by the State is reduced and, consequently, the capacity of the Government is reduced. to promote activities for the development of the country.
In the case of imports, the effect of under-invoicing is doubly harmful for the country because, in addition to reducing tax collection, it also has a negative impact on the business environment by allowing national producers to compete with importers who lower the burden of taxes on imports. levied on artificially imported products by declaring prices lower than the real one. This unfair competition reduces investors’ appetite to set up businesses in Mozambique.
The group defined a set of actions for establishing procedures for verifying the prices declared by exporters and importers and applying taxation based on market prices, and listed measures to increase inspection of imports and exports.
Regarding measure 15, actions were discussed to simplify the business licensing process through the expansion of the list of economic activities that will be exempt from obtaining a license and will be able to start their operations more quickly. In addition, a series of activities are underway for the implementation of the e-BAU (electronic version of the Single Service Desk) which will allow companies to obtain simplified licensing through the Government’s website. The first step will be to replace the current system of service stations at the Single Service Desk.
The detailed work plan will be finalized by the working group within the next 15 days and the actions should come into force already in the coming months.
