Mbeya. The Tanzania Chamber of Commerce,
Industry and Agriculture (TCCIA) in Mbeya Region says some taxes are
among the causes that discourage investors from investing and promoting
businesses in the region.
TCCIA Regional Coordinator
Emily Malinza said this yesterday during TCCIA’s regional general
meeting that took place at the Youth Centre.
Mr Malinza noted that some taxes were a big challenge discouraging investors willing to invest in the region.
“We,
as TCCIA in Mbeya Region, want investors to come and invest in various
sectors of the economy not only in Mbeya Region, but also in the country
in general. There are complaints about some taxes. This is true because
we conducted an in-depth research that showed it was a perennial
problem facing them,” said Mr Malinza.
He said they
planned to meet the relevant authorities so that they could present
their research findings and hold talks with a view to advising the
government to form only one organ with the duty of collecting tax unlike
now as every department had its own procedures of demanding and
collecting tax.
Earlier, participants, who were mainly
traders in the region, said none of them refused to pay tax as they were
aware that it was the backbone of any nation in terms of having a
strong tax base, but they were complaining about too many taxes imposed
on them.
A businesswoman running a sunflower oil
processing plant in Mbalizi, Ms Bahati Nkubilo, was of the opinion that
the government should form only one organ to collect tax.
Another
trader, Mr Leornad Nyirenda, from the city, said many of them had no
big area to carry out their small-scale industry activities, a situation
that slowed that the government’s goal of attaining industrialisation.
He
appealed to the government, as it was looking at the issue of taxes, to
create a good environment for entrepreneurs by allocating areas to them
to establish their own industries unlike now they were carrying out
their activities in residential areas.
Mbeya is one of
Tanzania’s regions with the investment potential because of its
favourable climate and the fact that it borders Malawi.
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