Workshop focuses on tax credit

By MARK HAIHUIE
A RANGE of issues surrounding Infrastructure Tax Credit Schemes (ITCS) were discussed by provincial and lower level government entities with resource companies at a workshop yesterday.
Currently, the national government has placed a temporary suspension on tax credit schemes to be reviewed to meet certain requirements.
Department of National Planning and Monitoring secretary Hakaua Harry said that this was to create a platform for stakeholder dialogue to improve the scheme.
“We want to have a frank talk and have honest exchanges towards finding an effective way to utilise tax credit to benefit the people of this country through our experiences so far,” Harry said.
“We have been talking about resources and the delivery of services through the tax credit and it is important for the implementation and reporting of this.”
She said the scheme was useful for the government that allows it to partner with the private sector to deliver for the people.
“And so this summit is a great opportunity to have an input on how best we should be doing this,” Harry said.
There were presentations on the income tax Act by the Internal Revenue Commission, a fiscal overview of the scheme from Treasury and governance issues by the PNG Extractive Industry Transparency Initiative.
Resource developers also presented on the challenges and prospects for ITCS, which included speakers from Oil Search, Ok Tedi Mining, Porgera Joint Venture, Newcrest Mining, New Britain Palm Oil and Hargy Oil Palm.
This was followed by an overview of the schemes implementation from the provincial administrations of Enga, Southern Highlands, Hela, Gulf, Western, West New Britain and New Ireland.
The one-day workshop had several question-and-answer segments and concluded with recommendations to be considered in government’s review of the tax credit schemes.