Luis Ravina director of the Navarra Center for International Development took part as an expert at the debate forum “Preparing the Conference on Financing for Development in Addis Abeba” organized by Cooperación Española at the University of Salamanca on the 25th of March.
The main goal of the meeting was to draft the Spanish position for the world conference about development financing which will take place in Addis Abeba, Ethiopia, this coming July.
“It has been stressed the need for a greater participation of universities in this process”, said Luis Ravina. Furthermore “it has been highlighted the importance of measuring the effect of certain policies”, a research practice that the NCID prioritizes, explained the professor of International Economics.
Fiscal Independence in developing countries
Blanca Moreno-Dodson, member of the NCID Steering Committee, also participated in the meeting. Her intervention focused on the taxation system of the developing countries. “The amount of tax evasion in developing countries due to aggressive tax evasion planning of multinationals companies and tax havens are alarming", said the lead economist at the World Bank. This implies that the resources to channel towards public goods and social services decrease and negatively influences equity and poverty reduction.
“One way to fight this problem –explained Luis Ravina – is through transparency, sharing information and ameliorating the public servant capacity in least developed countries.
Blanca Moreno-Dodson suggested that Spain should join “current global efforts to help these countries that have a poor tax contribution to collect more, not from their domestic taxpayers but from multinational companies”. Fiscal independence is very important because it strengthens the country institution and makes the country independent of foreign aid.
Movilizando los recursos y los medios de apoyo para hacer realidad la agenda de desarrollo post-2015, economic report presented at the debate.
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