Why 'tax is the only exit strategy from aid in the long term'

As foreign aid budgets continue to shrink, “tax is going to be the linchpin of development finance,” according to Giulia Mascagni, executive director of the International Centre for Tax and Development.

While the decline in aid is concerning, aid was never going to be sufficient to fully finance the U.N. Sustainable Development Goals, she said during a Devex event on the sidelines of the Fourth International Conference on Financing for Development, or FfD4, in Sevilla, Spain.

In fact, tax revenues overtook aid as the primary source of development financing nearly two decades ago, she said.