Chaired by Prime Minister of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan, a consultation on the assessment of the tax potential took place.
The meeting was attended by Deputy Prime Minister Tigran Khachatryan, Minister of Economy Vahan Kerobyan, Minister of Finance Vahe Hovhannisyan, Chairman of the Standing Committee on Financial Credit and Budgetary Affairs of the National Assembly Gevorg Papoyan, Chairman of the Central Bank Martin Galstyan, Deputy Chairman of the National Assembly Standing Committee on Economic Affairs Babken Tunyan, Chairman of the State Revenue Committee Rustam Badasyan and other officials.
At the beginning of the consultation, Prime Minister Pashinyan stated: "As we agreed at the end of last year, this year we will have periodic discussions regarding the evaluation of the tax potential of the Republic of Armenia. We will try to assess how far our tax revenues are, in what relation or distance from the tax potential of our country."
Next, the actual state budget revenue from value added tax, income tax and social fees, as well as profit tax, the potential opportunities for increasing tax revenues and the steps to be taken in the direction of reducing the shadow economy were addressed. An exchange of ideas took place around the presented assessments, various observations and recommendations were made in the direction of attracting potential tax funds to the state budget. The existing problems in the field of turnover tax and their possible solutions were also discussed.
Prime Minister Pashinyan emphasized the consistent and effective fight against corruption in tax, customs and other areas, as well as manifestations of shadow economy. In the context of realizing the tax potential, the Prime Minister said: "It is necessary to understand the effective methodology of work, clearly record the problems and go for concrete solutions. In this regard, deep and radical reforms are needed." The Prime Minister instructed to continue the discussions and submit appropriate recommendations aimed at the full realization of the tax potential.