Ministry of Finance of Republic of Indonesia : Government Focuses on Individual Taxpayer to Achieve 2016 Tax Revenue Target

Jakarta, 12/01/2016 MoF - To achieve the tax revenue target in 2016, the Government will focus on the individual taxpayer. The Minister of Finance Bambang P.S. Brodjonegoro says that tax revenue from them can still be explored.

In a press conference on tax revenues in 2015 in the Central Office of the Directorate General of Taxes, Jakarta on Monday (11/1), the minister says, although exceeded the target in 2015, tax revenue from the individual taxpayer nominally was too low. 'Tax revenue from the individual taxpayer is still very low. Although it exceeded the target this year (2015), but the number is still too low,' he says.

The exploring potential tax revenue from the individual taxpayer is important to reduce dependence on tax revenue from corporate taxpayer, the minister says. Thus, the volatility of tax revenue can be minimized. 'If we are too dependent on Corporate Income Tax, the tax revenue will be volatile. If the economic growth is good, corporate income tax revenues will increase. In contrary, if the economy is slowing down, it will down,' he added.

In addition, this year, the government will also improve community's awareness on Taxpayer Identification Number (TIN). Acting Director General of Taxes Ken Dwijugiasteadi explains, statistically there are 129 million of middle class with spending of IDR100 thousand to IDR200 thousand per day. However, only 27 million of them have had TIN.

'We want to build our citizens' awareness to have TIN, so that any specific transactions will be easily tracked,' says the minister. (nv)