Tax to be the backbone of the state's fiscal revenue, says Finance Ministry

Yogyakarta (ANTARA) — Director General of Taxes of the Ministry of Finance (Direktorat Jenderal Pajak, DGT) Bimo Wijayanto said that in the current era taxes have become the backbone of the state’s fiscal framework from the revenue side. ‘The broad context of the strategic mandate of the Directorate General of Taxes and the challenges of revenue collection, as everyone understands, is that taxes inevitably become the backbone of the state’s fiscal framework from the revenue side,’ he said during the seminar on ‘Collaborating Optimally Towards Fair and Consistent Tax (KOMPAK)’ at Gadjah Mada University (UGM) in Yogyakarta on Thursday. He noted that looking at the 2026 tax revenue target in Indonesia, it will rise by about 22.9 percent compared with last year’s achievement. ‘Last year we reached Rp1,917 trillion; this year the target rises to Rp2,357.7 trillion. So each month we must record performance of at least 23.9 percent, month-on-month and year-on-year, cumulatively,’ he said. ‘Thus the strategic mandate is to carry out a series of action plans and to execute them in a disciplined manner with a cleaner, more integrated, and more optimal tax-collection machine,’ he added. According to him, taxes can no longer be viewed as a narrow instrument of government revenue, but also as part of the national economic strategy, and a strategy to position Indonesia in the global competitive arena. He said this is because global fragmentation is becoming more evident. And global geopolitical competition will significantly affect trade, investment and even fiscal policy.