Keeping tax transparency high on the agenda of Governments and taking steps to ensure a worldwide level playing field will top the agenda during the 8th meeting of the Global Forum on Transparency and Exchange of Information for Tax Purposes, in Bridgetown, Barbados on 29-30 October 2015.

The CREDAF Working group on BEPS held its second physical meeting in Paris on 2 November 2015, following the one that took place in Kinshasa on 27 May 2015. Twenty five participants gathered to discuss the work to be performed within the implementation phase of the OECD/G20 BEPS Project.

On 17-18 November 2015, a new regional meeting as well as a governmental workshop on BEPS was held for the Latin America and the Caribbean region to discuss the outcomes of the BEPS Project, and the ways that the countries can explore to be involved on an equal footing in the implementation and the monitoring phase of the measures adopted.

OECD urges efforts to better price carbon as new analysis finds that 90% of CO2-emissions are priced below EUR 30 per tonne, a low-end estimate of climate damage, and 60% are not priced at all. Effective Carbon Rates in the OECD and Selected Partner Economies calculates effective carbon rates (ECR) on CO2-emissions from energy use for 41 countries which together use 80% of global emissions.

On 1 December 2015 the OECD agreed on a common way forward in response to a request submitted by the European Commission pursuant to a mandate from EU Member States to include additional fields in the CRS XML Schema. This request was made further to the work of the European Commission and the EU Member States on the implementation of the Standard for Automatic Exchange of Financial Information in Tax Matters within the European Union.

On 17 December 2015 Greenland signed the Multilateral Competent Authority Agreement‎, re-confirming its commitment to implement automatic exchange of financial account information in time to exchange in 2017.

As part of continuing efforts to boost transparency by multinational enterprises (MNEs), 31 countries signed today the Multilateral Competent Authority Agreement (MCAA) for the automatic exchange of Country-by-Country reports. The signing ceremony marks an important milestone towards implementation of the OECD/G20 BEPS Project and a significant increase in cross-border cooperation on tax matters.

On 22-23 February 2016, a regional network meeting on the implementation of the BEPS package was held in Dakar (Senegal), by the OECD in partnership with the CREDAF (Centre de Rencontres et d'Etudes des Dirigeants des Administrations Fiscales).

On 1-3 March 2016, the OECD hosted two important events for the international tax community. The Task Force on Tax and Development and the Global Forum on Transfer Pricing gathered over 230 participants representing 84 jurisdictions and 11 international and regional organisations.

The world’s leading forum on tax transparency published 10 new peer review reports today, pointing to ever-increasing compliance with the internationally-recognised standards to curb tax evasion through the exchange of information.

A special project meeting of the Joint International Tax Shelter Information and Collaboration (JITSIC) Network took place at the OECD in Paris on Wednesday 13 April, bringing together senior tax administration officials from countries worldwide to discuss opportunities for obtaining data, co-operation and information-sharing in light of the “Panama Papers” revelations.

The international community should call time on all remaining holdouts who have yet to implement internationally agreed tax transparency standards, OECD Secretary General Angel Gurría said in a new report to the G20.

Bermuda became the 33rd signatory of the Multilateral Competent Authority Agreement for the automatic exchange of Country-by-Country reports (CbC MCAA), which is based on Article 6 of the Multilateral Convention on Mutual Administrative Assistance in Tax Matters and puts in place the automatic exchange framework for exchanging Country-by-Country Reports, as contemplated by BEPS Action 13.

The role of tax administrations in implementing the OECD/G20 work on the international tax agenda will be the focus of the 10th Plenary meeting of the OECD Forum on Tax Administration (FTA) to be held in Beijing, People's Republic of China, on 11-13 May 2016.

As part of continuing efforts to boost transparency by multinational enterprises (MNEs), Canada, Iceland, India, Israel, New Zealand and the People’s Republic of China signed today the Multilateral Competent Authority agreement for the automatic exchange of Country-by-Country reports (“CbC MCAA”), bringing the total number of signatories to 39 countries. The signing ceremony took place in Beijing, China.

Representatives of countries and jurisdictions worldwide will gather in Kyoto, Japan on 30 June and 1 July for a special meeting of the OECD Committee on Fiscal Affairs organised to take forward the OECD/G20 Base Erosion and Profit Shifting (BEPS) Project.

Representatives of more than 80 countries and jurisdictions have gathered in Kyoto, Japan to push forward ongoing efforts to update international tax rules for the 21st century, the latest step in the OECD/G20 Project to tackle Base Erosion and Profit Shifting (BEPS).

The OECD has today released its standardised IT-format for providing structured feedback on exchanged Common Reporting Standard information – the CRS Status Message XML Schema – as well as the related User Guide.

Israel’s growing population and rising incomes have seen consumption increase substantially, bringing with it considerable pressure on the environment. One of the main environmental pressures is from the ever-increasing transport activity, especially the use of private vehicles. Although travelling in a private vehicle brings benefits to the individual using it, this entails costs to society as a whole.

57 delegates from 10 countries and 8 organisations gathered in Montevideo for the 1st regional meeting of the Inclusive Framework on Base Erosion and Profit shifting (BEPS) after its launch in Kyoto on 29 June-1st July 2016.

Today, as a further step to implement the OECD Common Reporting Standard (CRS), the first series of bilateral automatic exchange relationships were established among the first batch of jurisdictions committed to exchanging information automatically as of 2017.

As part of continuing efforts to boost transparency by multinational enterprises (MNEs), Brazil, Guernsey, Jersey, the Isle of Man and Latvia signed today the Multilateral Competent Authority Agreement (MCAA) for the automatic exchange of Country-by-Country reports, bringing the total number of signatories to 49.

On 20 October, the OECD released the key documents that will form the basis of the Mutual Agreement Procedure (MAP) peer review and monitoring process under Action 14 of the BEPS Action Plan. In accordance with the Assessment Methodology, the reviews will be conducted in batches, with the first batch commencing in December 2016.

This paper explores the practical challenges tax policy analysts face when trying to apply differential taxation to “normal” and “excess” returns. The distinction between these two elements is being increasingly used in tax policy. The problem is that there is no clear definition for a “normal” return.

56 delegates from 13 countries gathered in Tunis for the first regional meeting of the Inclusive Framework on Base Erosion and Profit Shifting (BEPS) after its launch in Kyoto on 30 June-1 July 2016. This meeting belongs to a new series of events that offer participants from different regions in the world the opportunity to feed their views and provide their input into the Inclusive Framework on BEPS.

These three tax events held on the side-lines of the 2nd High-Level Meeting of the Global Partnership for Effective Development Co-operation in Nairobi were organised by the OECD in partnership with UNDP, UN, World Bank, International Monetary Fund and with support from a geographically wide and diverse coalition of partners including governments and regional tax organisations.

Fifty delegates from sixteen countries, four international organisations, business and civil society gathered in Manila for the first regional meeting of the Inclusive Framework on Base Erosion and Profit shifting (BEPS) in the Asia-Pacific region after the launch of the Inclusive Framework in Kyoto on 30 June-1st July 2016.

The OECD’s work to advance tax certainty specifically includes work to improve the timeliness of processing and completing mutual agreement procedure (MAP) cases under tax treaties and to enhance the transparency of the MAP process. As part of that work, the OECD makes available annual statistics on the MAP caseloads of all its member countries and of non-OECD economies that agree to provide such statistics.

More than 60 delegates from 14 countries gathered in Vilnius for the first regional meeting of the Inclusive Framework on BEPS in the region. This meeting was the last of a series of regional events in 2016 intended to offer countries in different regions of the world the opportunity to feed their views and provide their input into the Inclusive Framework on BEPS.

Today, another important step to implement the OECD Common Reporting Standard (CRS) was taken, with a further 350 bilateral automatic exchange relationships being established between over 50 jurisdictions committed to exchanging information automatically pursuant to the OECD Common Reporting Standard (CRS), starting in 2017.

Comments are invited on draft examples included in a discussion draft on the follow-up work on the ineraction between the treaty provisions of the report on BEPS Action 6 and the treaty entitlement of non-CIV funds.

As part of continuing efforts to boost transparency by multinational enterprises (MNEs), Gabon, Hungary, Indonesia, Lithuania, Malta, Mauritius and the Russian Federation have now signed the Multilateral Competent Authority Agreement for Country-by-Country Reporting (CbC MCAA), bringing the total number of signatories to 57. Lithuania and Hungary joined the Agreement in October and December 2016 respectively.

The OECD is now gathering input for the Stage 1 peer reviews of Austria, France, Germany, Italy, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg and Sweden, and invites taxpayers to submit input on specific issues relating to access to MAP, clarity and availability of MAP guidance and the timely implementation of MAP agreements for each of these jurisdictions using the taxpayer input questionnaire.

Today the OECD released key documents, approved by the Inclusive Framework on BEPS, which will form the basis of the peer review of Action 13 Country-by-Country Reporting and for the peer review of the Action 5 transparency framework.

On 6 January 2017, public comments were invited on draft examples prepared as part of the follow-up work on the interaction between the treaty provisions of the report on BEPS Action 6 and the treaty entitlement of non-CIV funds. The OECD is grateful for the input and now publishes a compilation of the comments received.

Almost 50 delegates from 14 countries and 7 organisations gathered in Tbilisi for the second regional meeting of the Inclusive Framework on Base Erosion and Profit Shifting (BEPS) in the Eastern Europe and Central Asia region.

Today, another important step was taken to implement Country-by-Country Reporting in accordance with the BEPS Action 13 minimum standard, through activations of automatic exchange relationships under the Multilateral Competent Authority Agreement on the Exchange of CbC Reports.

As part of its ongoing efforts to maintain the integrity of the Common Reporting Standard (CRS), the OECD is today launching a disclosure facility on the AEOI portal which allows interested parties to report potential schemes to circumvent the CRS.Over 1800 bilateral exchange relationships in place for the exchange of CRS information.

Today the OECD released the key document, approved by the Inclusive Framework on BEPS, which will form the basis of the peer review of the Action 6 minimum standard on preventing the granting of treaty benefits in inappropriate circumstances.

The OECD is now gathering input for the Stage 1 peer reviews of the Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, Korea, Norway, Poland, Singapore and Spain, and invites taxpayers to submit input on specific issues relating to access to MAP, clarity and availability of MAP guidance and the timely implementation of MAP agreements for each of these jurisdictions using the taxpayer input questionnaire.

Viet Nam has become the 100th jurisdiction to join the Inclusive Framework on BEPS ("IF") on an equal footing with all other IF members, as announced by Mr. DANG NGOC Minh (Deputy General Director of the General Department of Taxation - GDT) at the third plenary meeting of the IF held on 21-22 June 2017 in Noordwijk, the Netherlands.

Over 200 delegates from 83 countries and jurisdictions as well as 12 international and regional organisations met in Noordvijk, The Netherlands, on 21-22 June 2017 for the Third Meeting of the Inclusive Framework on Base Erosion and Profit Shifting (BEPS).

Tax evasion continues to challenge governments in developing and developed countries alike, depriving them of resources that would otherwise be available to support sustainable development through investments in infrastructure, health and other common goods.

Fifty delegates representing 10 countries gathered in Cotonou (Benin) on 3-5 July 2017 for the second regional meeting of the Inclusive Framework on Base Erosion and Profit Shifting (BEPS) for French speaking countries. These regional meetings offer participants from around the world the opportunity to provide their views and input to the Inclusive Framework on BEPS.

International cooperation is now more critical than ever, OECD Secretary-General Angel Gurría said following a G20 Leader’s Summit marked both by controversy but also advances on a range of policies to tackle global challenges.

Costa Rica has made significant economic and social progress over the last decades. Real GDP per capita continues to increase at rates which outperform many other Latin American and OECD countries. But while living standards and well-being have increased, tax reforms are essential now to ensure the sustainable development of Costa Rica’s economy, according to a new OECD report.

Today at the OECD Headquarters in Paris, Nigeria signed two major multilateral instruments: the Multilateral Convention to Implement Tax Treaty Related Measures to Prevent Base Erosion and Profit Shifting (the MLI) and the CRS Multilateral Competent Authority Agreement‎ (the CRS MCAA). Nigeria becomes the 71st jurisdiction to sign the MLI and the 94th jurisdiction to join the CRS MCAA.

Greenland, Cambodia, Madagascar and Haiti have joined the Global Forum on Transparency and Exchange of Information for Tax Purposes as its 143rd, 144th, 145th and 146th members.

At present, 102 jurisdictions have publicly committed to implement the Common Reporting Standard, with 49 being committed to start exchanges this month and a further 53 taking up exchanges in September 2018.

This paper examines the role of businesses in the tax system. In addition to being taxed directly, businesses act as withholding agents and remitters of tax on behalf of others. Yet the share of tax revenue that businesses remit to governments outside of direct tax liabilities is under-studied.