Vanessa van den Boogaard Leads Discussions on Taxing the Informal Sector at African Tax Research Network Congress

Vanessa van den Boogaard, a Senior Research Fellow at the Munk School and Research Fellow at the International Centre for Tax and Development (ICTD), recently participated in the 9th annual Congress of the African Tax Research Network, co-hosted by the ICTD in Gaborone, Botswana. Vanessa led discussions on taxing the informal sector, an issue critical to sustainable development in African economies.

In early September, the ICTD co-hosted the 9^th annual Congress of the African Tax Research Network in Gaborone, Botswana. Vanessa van den Boogaard, Senior Research Associate at the Munk School and Research Fellow at the ICTD, played a key role, leading sessions focused on the complex issue of taxing the informal sector. Alongside ICTD colleague Max Gallien, Vanessa drew upon years of ICTD research to examine the challenges and risks of taxing the informal sector, highlighting how current policy approaches often fail to achieve meaningful revenue while negatively impacting equity.

In addition to the plenary discussion, the ICTD’s tax and informality team hosted an interactive workshop, engaging with African revenue authorities to capture their recent experiences in taxing informal sector businesses. The workshop offered an opportunity to explore more effective policy directions, with a particular focus on improving outcomes by targeting higher-income operators.

The Congress represented an important step forward in the partnership between the ICTD and the African Tax Administration Forum, setting the foundations for future joint research and policy engagement on taxation and the informal sector across the African continent.

More information on the ICTD’s research programme on tax and informality can be found here, while Vanessa’s work on the topic can be found here.