 Thank you very much for the invitation to read and discuss those papers. I found them really interesting and I'm glad to be here discussing them. I'll make two general comments before going into the details of each of the three papers and the first one is this. Those three papers as well as many others that we've seen today are based on microdata from administrative sources and these might seem quite normal for those of you who have started engaging with that quite recently, but when I started doing this research 10 years ago, there was no study using administrative data from any African country. So it's really amazing that we're now in a position where we can have a whole conference with so much great research using this data to inform policy and to promote evidence-based policymaking. I think this is really something to be celebrated both for the researchers who are doing this work, but also for the revenue authorities who are opening up and making this data available, which is not obvious at all. The second general point is that I think my main takeaway from many of the presentations we've seen today, and particularly the one on corporate income tax and UCAS presentation, is that progressive tax reform is possible. It has benefits on revenue and perhaps we shouldn't be too worried about the tax base being eroded as a result of increasing effective rates on higher income earners or large corporations. But I'll get into a bit more details. I think that's important as we think about the title of the conference, which is about increasing revenue. It's obviously a very important objective given that the big gap that exists. But as we do that, it's quite important for policymakers to keep in mind equity particularly as well as efficiency and not just increase taxes for the sake of increasing taxes in ways that are not necessarily equitable. So the examples today are examples of progressive reform. I think this is very good. Now I've been asked by the chair to focus on policy messages and push the researchers to think about policy implications. So I'll try to do that. When it comes to the VAT GAP paper, again, the researchers are able to show really detailed results about the VAT GAP by year, by firm size, by VAT status, zero tax, positive tax and so on. And that is allowed by the micro data that you're using. But I wonder if I can push you to speak maybe a little bit more about what does that data allow you to say that is new. How do your results compare with the macro estimates of the VAT GAP? And what can you tell policymakers in terms of actions that your data allows you to say that that wasn't necessarily possible before? So I'd like to hear your reflections on that and perhaps also on your estimates. So you say they are lower bound and I see why you say that but then I also read your paper and I know that the audit process is risk-based. So if it is risk-based and if it works, it means riskier firms are included in the auditing process. If the whole process works, they should be evading more than others. So by applying the same parameters to the whole population, you're actually over estimating evasion and perhaps comparing the macro and micro figures might help to figure out where your estimates stand in terms of over or under estimation. Now, of course, the VAT paper was mostly about outright evasion based on audits, but we know that gaps in tax revenue can be due to evasion, to avoidance, or sometimes governments themselves leaving money on the table through exemptions. And I think that's where the second paper comes in a bit on corporate income tax. I found it really interesting to actually see a country-level research looking at the implications of those global negotiations on national tax administration and I think more of that is needed, especially because there is still lots of skepticism about how much those new global rules will actually change for lower-income countries. Your results show some revenue gains. They also show some behavioral responses for multinational firms. Again, I have a comment and a question. The comment is, or maybe it's also a question, I'm not quite sure about using elasticity from other studies in this case because the innovative thing about those tax rules is exactly that they are coordinated across countries. So elasticity means you reduce your income because the tax rate is higher because you have an opportunity to do so. Now, if these rules work, it means every it means those firms will pay 15 percent. The only question is where? So the only question is, will Uganda get that 15 percent or will the other country where the firm is based take it? So I think possibly you're overestimating maybe those responses a little bit because if the system works, the opportunities for shifting income across countries shouldn't be that high and that's the whole point of having a coordinated global minimum tax. Then along the same lines of the previous comments on the previous papers, I wonder if doing such a detailed analysis with the microdata allows you to say a little bit about what the URA, the Uganda Revenue Authority, should do to close those compliance, those corporate income tax gaps. Can you say something about whether that is mostly about decreasing incentives or whether perhaps it is about addressing corporate tax avoidance? What is it that that they should be doing tomorrow based on your experience doing research? Now the final paper, Yuka's work, I really enjoyed reading the paper, seeing the presentation. Thanks a lot for that. Again, for me, that is it's a very positive message about progressive tax reform because it was a from an equity perspective and an obvious reform to do, relieving those with lower incomes from paying tax, increasing to a reasonable extent tax rates on higher earners and your results show that the behavioral response is actually not that large. So again, from a policymaker's perspective, perhaps policy makers shouldn't be too worried, especially for higher earners on employment incomes to to see their tax base eroded as a result of increasing rates. I think again a comment and a question and then I'll leave the floor to the researchers themselves. The comment is I was really intrigued by your result that actually there seems to be a behavioral response for employees of firms that are not under the large taxpayers office. So when there is a bit less enforcement pressure on firms, there seems to be income shifting and that to me from a policy perspective speaks a lot to the role of firms as key players in improving compliance and and potentially those higher income earners colluding with firms to minimize tax payments. So even for personal incomes, there is a very important role for firms. And I wonder if that's something you can speak to in terms of policy implications. And then the second very quick one is pay as your own taxes on employment income are usually thought of as harder to evade. So I I'm encouraged by your results, but culturally so because I cautiously so because I'm wondering if you can say something about taxing the wealthy more generally because that is for me it's a clear direction for reform. Part of the direction of reform is applying the taxes that are already in the tax system on capital gains, investment income, rental income and so on. And and those are quite likely to have slightly higher elasticities. But I'd be interested in hearing your thoughts, even though I know that is not exactly what you what you focused on. And the fact that you find some suggestive evidence of income shifting makes me wonder if what policymakers should take away from research like like yours that you've just presented is sort of an attempt to equalize rate equalize rates across tax types. Some countries already do that. Most countries don't. So obviously, if the tax rate on dividends is the same as unemployment income, you just take away the possibility of shifting income to minimize taxes. So these are my these are my comments. Again, really nice to see so much work using micro data. It's a it's a great development and I feel quite encouraged by your results that progressive tax reform is not only desirable, but indeed quite feasible from an economic and revenue perspective. So thanks a lot for that. Thank you, Julia, for your insightful comments. So I would like to welcome all the researchers in the front of so we can have a round of questions, but first of all, I would give the floor to Sebastian to answer some of the children's points and then Paul and then Njuka. And after that, we could take some questions from the audience. Well, thank you, Julia, for the comments. I so much agree with all and actually, fortunately, one of the author of this paper, my co-author is also an author of a more macro data estimation of the PED GABA and we are trying kind of okay, you obtained this, so we should obtain something similar or explain why we are not obtaining something similar. So part of our next step is to go further in how to estimate better or predict better evasion to much better, because only to include also we have zero evasion for the VAT, so we can kind of predict what film could show zero evasion and so on, so improve more. So I so much agree about the policy recommendation. My impression is there is something happen with this kind of fly under the radar that we need to understand and we need to attack. So if we already know that there is so less auditing for small-sized firms and they are evading a lot, okay, so it looks like we should put more effort to auditing small-sized firm. So could be that some of them are not small because of market things, it's because they are evading, actually. But all the other things, I so much agree, thank you, we are working on that. For me also, I agree with everything you say and we'll go forward and implement all of your recommendations except the one on elasticities from other countries, I don't know what else we can do without them. I guess we have to provide something, even though it would come from a point of weakness, but that's how we improve knowledge so that the next generation of researchers will hopefully use Ugandan elasticities, but given that now we don't have them, even the ones we have are not published, they are just from, they come from a position, they come from a place where it's because we are privileged to be in certain positions so we get to see some studies before they are published, like the one I told you about World Bank, but we can't really use it because also it's work in progress so I think you will excuse us to continue as long as we can provide justification and be within a band where we minimize the errors, but otherwise like your comments particularly on what your ratio do to close the gap, apart from just relying on global initiatives, I think we'll provide that in the paper. Thank you very much. Yeah, I just continue saying the same so I completely agree. So you asked about the policy implications for the rise from income shifting, so to the extent income shifting is so that's a form of avoidance, motivation, so so it wouldn't mean that those engaged in this would be working against the law, but I suspect that then the, so one way of seeing it for the point of view of society as whole could be that then the, I mean the, if that's where the behavioral reaction comes from, it's perhaps less harmful for the economic activity than a real drop would be. Now, about other types of taxes to the high income earners, so we were curious about the personal income taxpayers in the in the Ugandan case, so these are firm owners who have firms that are not corporations, but rather partnerships or sole proprietors and there were so few of them that we couldn't do any meaningful statistical analysis on using those data, so for the high income earners, what happens to this group that we are now analyzing completely dominates the revenue and inequality implications for the case of Uganda. Point taken when it comes to all these other taxes that we could levy on the on the wealthy, including the various sorts of capital income, capital gains, et cetera. I've seen no work in the African context on these and even though they wouldn't be raising much revenue, they would still be quite crucial in terms of backstop as a backstop on trying to avoid some of these income shifting or even outright evasion opportunities, so more work on that would definitely be welcome and maybe the most promising one there and this comes close to what was discussed in the opening plenary is the real estate and property taxes. Thank you, Jukka and Paul and Sebastian, so next we will have a question from the audience. Let's take because we have quite a plenty of time, so three questions and then we give the time for our researchers to answer. So there is in the back there is two questions already, so here in the in there yeah go ahead here. Thank you so much Helge Fjellstaff from CMI, Bergen, Norway. Yeah very interesting papers and I agree very much with what Julia said about now things are moving well or it's very promising the research which now can use administrative data, the collaborative research between tax administration and researchers. I have a question to Sebastian, the first paper on Tanzania. There has been because for long there has been concern in Tanzania among policymakers, among IMF and others that the tax gap is very very high there also relatively much higher in Tanzania than in other countries also in other compared to other East African countries and there has been some studies which has addressed this previously, UNECAS had they estimated almost 80 percent, 70 percent something like that was the VAT gap and but this study you have been involved with Sebastian is obviously one of the most solid one credible ones I believe I've seen but the discussion is what is actually how do you explain that and you refer to tax evasion and so on but the exemption regimes isn't that also a part of the story you might have mentioned it but that we know also that the tax exemption, the statutory exemptions are a part of the story and how do you take that into consideration that is not evasion that is by law and then the question is the next question is related to what is driving tax of VAT evasion. One thing is that you estimate there is a big VAT gap here okay but what is driving the evasion and what I find in my own work in Tanzania is the part of the story at least is that the massive delays in VAT reimbursement company reclaiming VAT so it in a way that people are or companies they perceive awaiting VAT is a way actually to handle this unfairness in in the tax system can you maybe reflect a little bit on those two issues thank you thank you and then we have a one in the back as well in the in here yeah thank you very much the presentations were very good and comprehensive mine goes to you can is probably something that was discussed also by Julia I'm trying to look at the issue of income shifting and when you talk about the idea of PIT for starters is it in terms of pay as you end because I'm trying to look at how you look at the compliance in that context because if it's under the pay as you and I would expect that since it's being deducted by the employers you wouldn't have much of a problem in terms of change in the rate but then if it's being done by individuals by themselves the challenge you mentioned were high net worth individuals you have a challenge with getting them to submit how does that come down to the smaller taxpayers I would expect more of a problem in that context as well in terms of those taxpayers when you look at the the shift from PIT to dividends that increase in the dividends what is the rate of dividends that's pertaining in probably in Uganda the country that you looked at is it lower than the rates on the PIT because if you adjust the PIT and it becomes high obviously there would be that incentive for the taxpayers to declare a revenue stream on which they will pay a lower tax also then now you look at what sort of dividend is it that they are getting because in partnerships obviously they will get a dividend from the partnership at the end of the day but that's not a final tax they still have to submit the personal income tax returns and get taxed under that same taxing regime and to conclude how do you handle now taxpayers who are self-employed but would probably opt to go in a turnover tax regime because that essentially offers the lowest rates that you would get so you'd find that most self-employed individuals would opt to be on turnover tax rather than file a PIT return which might even be a bit too complex for small taxpayers I submit thank you and then we have a one one question again in the back so yeah thank you so much to all the presenters mine is not exactly a question but a request for having more specific discussion of results and dissemination of findings to specific countries which are the where the data has been sourced specifically to revenue authorities, minister of finance for purposes of actually impacting policy in those specific area countries thank you thank you for the question so I will first give Sebastian time to answer the first question and then of course you can take the floor well thanks for the question and the comment regarding the second question we discuss how to measure and find the mechanism behind evasion obviously partly because of all of your work in Tanzania actually we didn't thought about this delay on credit or see about credit which is a variable that we can estimate or create from our data so thank you very much we will see this but definitely is something that we have in our agenda to investigate because it's quite surprising the bunching at zero for all the firms and this is monthly declaration so something is happened and regarding exemption I also so much agree what we only did but seeing data is how are the exemption regarding the BIT evasion that we discover by groups and looks I mean looks like we cannot say anything for that but what we have in mind to explore with the deep in the specification exemption and zero rated because we believe that something is happened perhaps they are declaring more or less there or they are reacting through this so this is a very good comment and so much agree with you thanks yes excellent excellent questions thank you for those I'm not sure certainly if I can come up with the very good answers maybe Maria can can help me here so I think I mean we haven't looked at it into this and we we should I mean I think we could spot the owner managers of small corporations because I mean if the manager is the person with the highest salary in that company so then I mean to see if this behavior is more prevalent there so then I guess if the same individual who's the employer and the employee then this sort of negotiations are easier right and and that that would be one case where we would be worried about the income shifting between the two bases the turnover taxpayers they are they are not in our sample and and and then the also the those who have partnerships they are excluded because there were too few of them to be included included here it's a good question also whether the incentives are there actually for this income shifting because the ukandan corporate income tax rate is quite high so I mean maybe it's because perhaps then the actual effective rate is it's very lower than the headline rate so that could be something that is then behind the results completely I mean I agreed on on the on the need to discuss these findings and and and we did one event just before the pandemic in ukanda and we are of course I mean planning to have other ones and and and we would be pleased to also I mean invite Paul to share his findings once the once the results are ready and Julia okays them for presentations as well so yes very very much agreed on that note thank you do we have other questions okay we have one in the in the middle we can take two or three of them if there is more than one yeah mine is not a question it's just to give more insight to the question that was directed to Sebastian there's a question that in Tanzania I think he there's the figure very high compared to other countries which is true it's not only because of tax evasion and the evidence it is also much to do that with the efficiency of institutions to collect the tax even with the rates which are there they could do a big job of collecting the tax but they don't do that's number one number two which is even much more serious is this actually disease by foreign aid that has not given enough efforts instead of the institution government to collect more so that is this is the kind which has been receiving a lot of foreign aid and there are arguments that that could be some of the reasons why we don't collect much of what was supposed to be collected and yes and this has been a debate between the president and the business community that they collectivity on the way for the government it takes many years for them to be reimbursed so that has done that has caused those who are the firms and the consumers those who are buying the products to collude not only that they don't give the receipts but even when they collect the VAT it takes so many years for them to be paid so they don't see a logic as per why they should engage in collecting the tax especially the VAT and that's why their study I think from Tehran they got even more more more percentage than what we got here so those are the some of the reasons that explain as per why Tanzania seem to be the top when it come no failure to collect the potential tax compared to other countries I think those are the some of the few points which I like the problem thank you and then behind you it was one question there in Mikas one it's just one on Tanzania is how are firms selected for audit and in particular could that have any bearing on the way in which you estimate for the full sample I have to add because Vincent should have known this but I don't agree at all and don't think any evidence supports the fact that aid has an adverse effect on tax revenue may have happened in the distant past certainly not the case now so that's not part of the story here and just a question for Paul more for information but how many firms in Uganda are multinationals in this sense like I'm sure there are some but I imagine they're and they're probably large taxpayers but there's small proportion of the population of firms so why do you think it would have an effect on on other firms okay thank you then we have a one online let's have that one at the third one and then researchers can answer yeah thank we will have one round more everything so there's a question online from Betia Huero could the issue of informal businesses contribute to tax evasion avoidance in VAT as formal businesses compete with the non-registered businesses hence low tax morale thank you and and and we will have now the responses and then after that we will have a one round more of questions so go ahead who wants to start Paul may begin yeah the the variable m and c's it's got from a study by Coivisto Coivisto and and and and company they they came up with an estimate of firms which are multinationals from the obis is it the obis database and matching it with the large taxpayer office so I would say maybe a thousand and that's quite significant given that not a lot of firms are pay CIT in Uganda majority are in the town of attacks schedule so yeah I would say not the majority but probably 40 percent of firms under the threshold of CIT are multinationals yeah and that could have a very big impact yeah thank you um yes more more general we know that the process to select firms to audit could bias our estimation and obviously the policy implication and the academic implication of this research in part is to improve perhaps the way in which we can estimate the VAT gap so what we have in mind is since we don't have particularly one for example rate or the assessment we only see the firms that were audited is try to estimate the probability of auditing and use these to predict auto sample the evasion so kind of if you are not audited but your probability to be audited is so high perhaps your evasion should be higher than what we are estimating now and vice versa if your probability of the denies low or so on so this is something that we have in mind to kind of improve the estimation but okay thank you then we had one more question at least from there and we can take another one if there is still some okay then behind it so first Joseph and then behind you mine is not even a question it's just probably a comment and following a recommendation that was made by Sebastian you mentioned that small firms need to be audited I think if I had you right sorry well the particular comment is what we saw in the data it's person that wise there are more large firms audited than small firms okay so if small firm are evading more perhaps redistributing to auditing small firm could be more efficient but this is obviously a preliminary recommendation okay it follows up from that because I think you basically need to be a little careful when making that kind of recommendation we were doing a study I think on audits looking at economic impacts of audits and what we've observed that the more the intensity of when you intensify audits on small firms they probably exit they change form there so I think the kind of audit really matters you basically the kind of recommendation you come up with will it be an issue audit to a comprehensive audit and all that so you need to be very careful when recommending maybe the kind of audit that is supposed to be done towards these firms thank you and then behind you was one more question yeah also for Sebastian I'm wondering if you're familiar with so for example the internal revenue service in the US has this program where they do a very small portion of audits actually at random with precisely the purpose of being able to sort of being able to do the sort of estimation that you do in a way that doesn't sort of face the comments that have you know that Julian Oliver both brought to you saying you know isn't this really a bias sample because the tax authority is not deciding who to audit at random and so wouldn't that be sort of possible policy recommendation of course you know the IRS might have very very different tax capacity than the Tanzanian tax authority but nonetheless it seems like it's a sort of relatively easy thing to implement that can vastly improve tax gap estimates thank you do we have any more questions I think okay okay that's the final one and then we give Sebastian time to answer no I think the what we agree on is that there is a very good development here now that we can use administrative data for our studies which is a new development as pointed out by Julia but we must also be careful when we use those data there are big flaws and I have digged into the VAT database in TRA there are a lot of problems with the dataset so but this is the data we have so that doesn't imply that we should not use it and I think it's very encouraging to see that people in the panel and others are using the administrative data but you have to be cautious trying to clean up the data and also be have a big cautious about some of the recommendation to come because the data are often very problematic but it's more problematic not to use them I think thank you thank you that's what's really like concluding with comments so but Sebastian if you want to answer some of the points you can do that yep very short I agree with the that all of us should be careful with the policy recommendation since this is very rarely been our work we still don't go further to really say okay this our policy recommendation and it's based on this that we are completely sure about that so I'm totally agree with this and regarding the random of the auditing process and how the auditing process actually is seen for firms I agree but I only want to point it out that we are here and well this is because I also work on this in not in firms in person I deeply believe that also people who take decision have resources to think as us so we start a kind of game theory play about okay you know that I know you know that I know you know that I know so it's always good come back and say okay we are in this game so perhaps this is obviously but if we think that this is obviously the other part could take advantage of us and so on so I think that is always kind of make okay we know that this is random but perhaps can we see if actually they are seen as random as we thought on so on so okay thank you Sebastian so I would like to thank everyone who have present today here in the session and provide some comments and and join the discussion so for my personal view I I'm happy to see this new studies coming up from these countries and I think it's very promising that in the future we know a little bit more about tax policies in the living countries and maybe can have some policy implications in the end but but thank you everyone I will close this