Following a surge in petroleum sector exploration, the Namibian authorities requested a review of their petroleum upstream fiscal regime. The petroleum fiscal regime balances investor and government interests and is fit for purpose although untested in practice. A number of recommended policy measures if implemented would provide clarity and simplicity for taxpayers while safeguarding government revenue collections. Fiscal transparency can be enhanced by publishing petroleum agreements while the costs and benefits of state participation should be considered.

The IMF’s Fiscal Affairs Department has been working with Mauritania on capacity building in tax policy. Mauritania has recently created a tax policy unit and adopted a new General Tax Code in 2019 with a corporate income tax and a semi-dual approach to personal income taxation. However, there is significant scope to enhance the efficiency and effectiveness of income taxes, including due to the proliferation of wasteful tax exemptions. The fast urbanization also calls for a review of recurrent property taxation. The formalization of property rights requires a temporary suspension of the excessive registration fees. Consumption taxation can also be improved by broadening the tax base, for example, by abolishing regressive value-added tax exemptions or by imposing excise taxes on imported used vehicles. Finally, several recommendations aim to support the reform of the Mining Code, such as introducing some progressivity, prohibiting the negotiation of any tax parameters, and strengthening the principle of ring-fencing.

This guide presents the analytical underpinnings and a user manual for the Excel-based Public Debt Dynamics Tool (DDT).

The mission assisted the staff of the Central Bank of the Republic of Azerbaijan (CBAR) in compiling financial soundness indicators (FSIs) in line with the IMF’s 2019 FSIs Compilation Guide. Specifically, the mission assisted the CBAR to compile 14 core and 9 additional monthly FSIs for deposit takers, one additional monthly FSI on real estate markets, and two additional quarterly FSIs on the size of other financial corporation’s subsector.

In 2022, Serbia introduced a new budget system law with fiscal rules based on general government, as defined in the international statistical standards. The Serbian Ministry of Finance is committed to upgrading their fiscal reporting so as to report against these fiscal rules by 2025. Against this background, the International Monetary Fund’s Statistics Department has provided technical assistance during 2022 and 2023 to assist the MOF to extend and improve their monthly government finance statistics, in accordance with the Government Finance Statistics Manual 2014, to cover all materially significant general government units.

The mission assisted the staff of the Maldives Monetary Authority (MMA) to compile financial soundness indicators (FSIs) in line with the IMF’s 2019 FSIs Compilation Guide, improve the data frequency of FSIs for deposit takers to monthly, and prepare new FSIs for insurance corporations.

Analytical work on Indonesian macroeconomic and financial issues, with an overarching theme on building institutions and policies for prosperity and inclusive growth. The book begins with a 20-year economic overview by former Finance Minister Chatib Basri, with subsequent chapters covering diverse sectors of the economy as well as Indonesia’s place in the global economy.

The International Monetary Fund’s (IMF’s) Statistics Department (STA) and Fiscal Affairs Department (FAD) provided technical assistance (TA) on government finance statistics (GFS) and public sector debt statistics (PSDS) to the Ministry of Finance (MOF) of the Arab Republic of Egypt during July 4–17, 2023. This was the first such mission since 2017 and the focus was on assisting the Egyptian MOF to identify the necessary processes and systems required to facilitate the production of high-quality fiscal statistics, compliant with the latest international statistical standards (as per the Government Finance Statistics Manual 2014) both with respect to coverage and presentation.

This note summarizes the main findings and action plan of the IMF Technical Assistance (TA) Scoping Mission to support the Colombian Autonomous Committee for the Fiscal Rule (CARF) in building capacity on macroeconomic forecasting and analysis. The TA was requested by the CARF to develop a macroeconomic projections tool, integrate its current satellite fiscal forecasting models, institutionalize the use of the tool, and develop a methodology to independently assess macro-fiscal forecasts produced by the Ministry of Finance.

This Technical Assistance followed a request by the Debt Management Directorate of the Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning (MINECOFIN) of Rwanda to develop the capacity in public debt projections and analysis. The development and discussion of DDT scenarios by officials contributed to a better understanding of debt projections across the MINECOFIN.