Online Reporter
Farirai Machivenyika
The Zimbabwe Revenue Authority is targeting a tax to GDP ratio of 22 percent by 2030 to generate revenues for Government’s development agenda, the tax collector’s Commissioner-General, Ms Regina Chinamasa has said.
Ms Chinamasa said this in an interview after she was named 2025 Chief Executive Officer of The Year as well as the best female director, by the Institute of Directors of Zimbabwe.
She said the awards were a recognition of the team work in the organisation.
“The awards that were accorded to us in my personal capacity and to the institution means a lot. I think it’s a recognition that Zimra, as the national revenue collector, is doing an incredible job to support Government programmes and projects.
“And these awards are really to the team Zimra, not to just myself, because I deliver through a team and the team has done exceptionally well in ensuring that we collect and we increase our revenue collections over the past five years under NDS1.
“As we look into the future, I think there is an increased requirements for Zimra to increase tax collection and we are focussing on the key efficient ratio of taxes to GDP. So, the target is to collect a minimum of 22 percent text to GDP by 2030. And we are putting in place strategies that ensure that we are able to collect these huge amounts,” she said.
Last year, the tax to GDP ratio was about 18 percent.
Ms Chinamasa said Zimra was also focusing on digitalisation and utilisation of modern technologies in their work.
“It’s a way to mitigate revenue leakages and also create capacity for us to tap into areas where we previously could not tap into because of manual processes. The other focus area is to increase on tax administration efficiencies. So, we’re not just looking at enforcement activities, but we are looking at how best we can offer services so that the tax payer feels comfortable to come forward and pay their taxes.
“And we are also focussing on development of our human resource, because this is our biggest asset, like I alluded to, for me to deliver, I deliver through a team. So, we’re looking at the capacity to modern skills, your data analytics, utilisation of AI, because we’re already in the AI environment. So, we need to work on capacitation and also to ensure that we retain these critical skills within the authority, because we are competing with high paying tax consultants.”
Ms Chinamasa said it was also important to retain skills within Zimra and also expand the tax base.
“The tax base is critical because any text system needs to be fair, and it needs to be transparent. So, for us going into the future, we want to make sure that every eligible taxpayer is contributing to the level of their capacity, so that we create an equitable tax base.
“We are also looking at trade facilitation and ease of doing business. This is critical in the essence that under NDS1 and NDS2, the issues around ease of doing business are a pivotal role.
“And we are looking at our processes and our systems to ensure that we minimise tax payers spending long hours to file their returns. So, we are also utilising or leveraging on digital systems so that we can manage the time taken to file or to pay their taxes.
“So, these are the key issues, revenue mobilisation and tax base expansion, trade facilitation and ease of doing business, human capacity development and retention and also utilisation of technology.”
