On 15 April, a round-table discussion on the issues of tax policy development and improvement of administration was held within the framework of the “Public Policy Monitoring and Improvement” sub-grant project implemented in the scope of the EU-funded “Commitment to Constructive Dialogue” Project.
Ms Anahit Ghazanchyan, representative of the “Development Principles” NGO and “Public Policy Monitoring and Improvement” Project Manager, in her welcoming speech noted that it seems that the structure of the working group is already shaping, as the people with notable professional skills participate in the discussion.
“Our objective is to highlight and discuss all the issues that are relevant to the application of legal acts regulating the taxation relations of non-governmental organisations. There have already been two roundtable discussions and many interesting views have been raised,” she said.
Mr. Armen Petrosyan, Project Expert presented the results of the previous two discussions. The acceptable definition of the term “grant” was approved, the distinguishing features of the services/works and grants were recorded.
A discussion on the statutory audit provisions was held and recommendations on the income tax and profit tax calculation issues and accounting features were made.
The “Commitment to Constructive Dialogue” project is implemented with the financial support of the European Union by a Consortium of civil society organisations, which are the Armenian Lawyers’ Association (lead organisation), Agora Central Europe (NGO based in the Czech Republic), the Armenian Centre for Democratic Education-CIVITAS, the International Centre for Human Development, the SME Cooperation Association and the Union of Communities of Armenia.
The project aims to enhance the influence of civil society organisations (CSOs) and CSO coalitions/networks on public policies in Armenia. This will allow organisations that are already working in sectoral coalitions to access additional resources, new groups of civil society experts to come together and encourage place their causes on the local and national policy agenda, to identify common concerns and priorities and approach government bodies with constructive and strategic policy engagement initiatives.
The project has provided sub-grants to 9 CSO coalitions that will be directed to the development of public policies and will have tangible results in the 9 target sectors selected within the project, which are: Justice, Human Rights, Public Finance Management, Business, Education, Social Sector (social inclusion of children with disabilities), Agriculture, Economy and Energy.
