Deputy Finance Minister, Dr. John Kumah, says the government’s push for the property tax rate is due to the introduction of technology in the collection of property taxes.

According to him, while property taxes are not new to Ghana, they have not been seamless and as a result have often failed to produce any significant revenue for government.

He stated that with the introduction of new technology to solve the issues inherent in the property tax rate regime, he is optimistic that revenue from the sector will experience a significant increment.

Speaking on JoyNews’ PM Express, Dr. John Kumah said, “So now government is introducing technology in the collection of the property tax rate. And now GRA and of course the private sector support are working with the various district assemblies in Ghana, you know a lot of work has gone into it.

“The Ghana Statistical Service has already done the census and identified about 8.5million houses across the country so now we know the number of houses. We needed the technology that could assist us to do proper location and identification of these houses and then the evaluation, the assessment of the cost, because if you haven’t done the evaluation of the property, how do you charge it?

“So all these things needed to be done and of course with support from the Ministry of Local Government, all these stakeholders have come to Ghana and all the grounds work has been done. We strongly believe that because of the technology that will assist in the identification and delivery of this property tax rate, we are going to see high increment and enforcement of that rate.

“So it’s taken a while, but at least in 2023 we’re going to begin to see results with the property tax rate.”

He further added that the government is very confident the introduction of the revamped property tax rate will be a significant addition to the government’s aggressive revenue mobilization toolkit.

“Of course 70% of all the revenues from that property tax will go to the District Assemblies and then the rest will go to GRA and part to Central Government. So definitely we’re very confident that this time it will be different because of the arrangements we have done and the background research and studies that have been done in terms of identification and proper evaluation of the properties,” he said.