Africa-Press – Botswana. Botswana Unified Revenue Services (BURS) has surpassing its set target of P34.8 billion.
Briefing the media on Tuesday, BURS Commissioner Finance and Administration, Ms Ediretse Mokara said by December 31, 2022, BURS had collected P35.1 billion in revenue, thus exceeding its set target.
Ms Mokara said it was pleasing that BURS remained steadfast in effectively executing its mandate of tax assessment and collection functions on behalf of the government.
Meanwhile, BURS board chairperson, Dr Lesedi Senatla said the organisation had been assigned the responsibility to collect the tax revenue and other revenues, which is critical to the country’s sustainable economic growth.
Dr Senatla said the BURS was thus living its motto of ‘collecting for progress’, adding that the significant work it does, to facilitate timely importation of raw materials and machinery necessary to stimulate growth of industries in the economy has led to employment creation and reduction of poverty levels.He stated that on average, BURS processes about P70 billion in imports and P60 billion in exports annually.
Dr Senatla said BURS had been called to action even more when government’s revenues were not keeping up with expenditure demands, (budget deficits) and especially so at the height of COVID-19 pandemic.
He said the BURS’ Board of Directors, were committed to transform the organisation into the envisioned centre of excellence in revenue collection, trade facilitation and border management, as evidenced by the continued support to management, through sanctioning initiatives and projects geared towards improving efficiency and effectiveness.
Dr Senatla said the organisation had since refreshed its 2019-24 strategy to align it with the government’s transformation strategies as well as to respond to the changed economic circumstances brought about by COVID-19 and other prevailing economic conditions.
He said other strategic priorities were improving tax compliance, transforming organisational culture, continuous stakeholder engagement, minimising and reducing tax leakage as well as conducting organisational restructuring and enhancing leadership capability.
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