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GENEVA / AFRICA ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT REPORT

Africa could gain 89 billion US dollars annually by curbing Illicit Financial Flows (IFFs) according to a new report from the United Nations Conference of Trade and Development (UNCTAD). UNTV CH
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unifeed200928f
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STORY: GENEVA / AFRICA ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT REPORT
TRT: 01:56
SOURCE: UNTV CH
RESTRICTIONS: NONE
LANGUAGE: ENGLISH / NATS

DATELINE: 28 SEPTEMBER 2020, GENEVA, SWITZERLAND

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FILE - GENEVA, SWITZERLAND

1. Wide shot, UN Geneva flag alley, flags fluttering

28 SEPTEMBER 2020, GENEVA, SWITZERLAND

2. SOUNDBITE (English) Oluyemi Oluleke Osinbajo, Vice President, Federal Republic of Nigeria:
“Illicit Financial Flows continue to impede these efforts and undermine continental and global actions for the sustenance of SDG gains and the acceleration of the achievement of sustainable development in this decade of action and deliver it. They undermine the foundations of democracy and provide the financial incentives for terrorist activities and fuel conflicts on the continent.”
3. Med shot, moderator
4. SOUNDBITE (English) Oluyemi Oluleke Osinbajo, Vice President, Federal Republic of Nigeria:
“In the context of COVID-19, such lack of resources and limited fiscal space gives an impulse to austerity, which is the last thing our economies need at a time of deep recessions. As several studies have shown, including the report of the High-Level Panel on Illicit Financial Flows from Africa, the commercial form of Illicit Financial Flows, especially tax evasion and aggressive tax avoidance accounts for up to 65 percent of Illicit Financial Flows.”
5. Med shot, moderator
6. SOUNDBITE (English) Mukhisa Kituyi, Secretary-General, UNCTAD:
“Countries with the high Illicit Financial Flows are demonstrably less productive in agriculture than those with more control of Illicit Financial Flows. Countries with high Illicit Financial Flows invest about 25 percent less in health, 58 percent less in education than comparable countries in the continent. And half of the countries in sub-Saharan Africa do not have sufficiently developed domestic transfer rules and regulation in their jurisprudence and therefore there is limited capacity of governments, on their own, to challenge multinational enterprises in their domestic courts on these flows.”
7. Med shot, participant

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Storyline

Africa could gain 89 billion US dollars annually by curbing Illicit Financial Flows (IFFs) according to a new report from the United Nations Conference of Trade and Development (UNCTAD).

Every year, the equivalent to 3.7 percent of Africa’s GDP, leaves the continent as illicit capital flight, according to UNCTAD’s Economic Development in Africa Report 2020 launched today (28 Sep).

At the launch of the report, the Vice President of Nigeria, Oluyemi Oluleke Osinbajo, said IFFs “continue to impede these efforts and undermine continental and global actions for the sustenance of SDG gains and the acceleration of the achievement of sustainable development in this decade of action and deliver it.”

He said IFFs “undermine the foundations of democracy and provide the financial incentives for terrorist activities and fuel conflicts on the continent.”

In the context of COVID-19, Oluleke Osinbajo said, “such lack of resources and limited fiscal space gives an impulse to austerity, which is the last thing our economies need at a time of deep recessions.”

He said the commercial form of Illicit Financial Flows, especially tax evasion and aggressive tax avoidance accounts for up to 65 percent” of IFFs

The Secretary-General of UNCTAD, Mukhisa Kituyi, said “countries with the high Illicit Financial Flows are demonstrably less productive in agriculture than those with more control of Illicit Financial Flows. Countries with high Illicit Financial Flows invest about 25 percent less in health, 58 percent less in education than comparable countries in the continent. And half of the countries in sub-Saharan Africa do not have sufficiently developed domestic transfer rules and regulation in their jurisprudence and therefore there is limited capacity of governments, on their own, to challenge multinational enterprises in their domestic courts on these flows.”

IFFs are movements of money and assets across borders which are illegal in source, transfer or use, according to the report entitled “Tackling illicit financial flows for sustainable development in Africa.”

The report shows that these outflows are nearly as much as the combined total annual inflows of official development assistance, valued at 48 billion US dollars, and yearly foreign direct investment, pegged at 54 billion US dollars, received by African countries – the average for 2013 to 2015.

From 2000 to 2015, the total illicit capital flight from Africa amounted to 836 billion US dollars. Compared to Africa’s total external debt stock of 770 billion US dollars in 2018, this makes Africa a “net creditor to the world”, the report says.

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