The G20 International Taxation Priorities Symposium is held here today on the sidelines of the first meeting of the Finance Ministers and Governors of the Central Banks of the Group of Twenty (G20) under the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia's presidency. In his speech, Mohammed bin Abdullah Al-Jadaan, Minister of Finance, welcomed the participants, affirming that the Kingdom is proud to host the G20 Summit and looks forward to work with the G20 partners to find solutions for upcoming challenges. "Today's event gives us an opportunity to evaluate the transparency we have achieved and discuss ways of achieving steady success. It will also provide an opportunity to discuss finding solutions to tax problems resulting from the digitization of the economy," AL-Jadaan said. "With the support of the G20 countries, the international community has achieved great successes in combating tax evasion and the transfer of profits. Today, the members of the Economic Cooperation Organization (ECO) of the G20 and the Global Forum on Transparency and Exchange of Information for Tax Purposes work together to implement internationally agreed standards of tax transparency," he said, pointing out that these standards represent the need to access to information for tax purposes and the need to protect the privacy of taxpayers. Al-Jadaan disclosed that more than 6000 bilateral cooperation agreements are signed, adding that these agreements are represented by the tax authorities around the world working on taking advantage of the automatic exchange of information mechanisms, where information was exchanged about 50 million fiscal accounts by the end of 2019 at a value of more than five billion euros. He added that nearly 100 billion euros were identified from additional tax revenue due to voluntary compliance mechanisms and investigations. The Saudi Minister of Finance asserted that the symposium will also discuss developments in the exchange of information for tax purposes and how tax transparency standards can evolve. The Minister stressed that everyone understands that digitization has a profound impact on the global economy and the way in which to conduct business, adding that the companies are now able to form great economic ties with countries, without a physical presence, and therefore, without a tax presence. He affirmed that these developments have made it necessary to modernize and reform the international tax system. The Minister of Finance indicated that the G20 leaders in 2018 committed to tackle the tax challenges arising from the digitization of the economy, as they mandated the G20 Economic Cooperation Organization of Inclusive Framework on Erosion and Basic Profit to provide a consensus-based solution to meet these tax challenges. He pointed out that constructive talks will be held during this event on how to move forward and improve the global tax system in a fair and responsible manner, hoping that this event will be fruitful and provide valuable visions to work during the Kingdom's presidency of the Group of Twenty.
