Kisumu County has sought the services of the Kenya Revenue Authority (KRA) in a bid to prop up local revenue collection.
Through the partnership with the authority, the lakeside County targets to collect at least Ksh 4 billion annually from local sources from the current Ksh 1.2 billion.
“We discussed on ways of enhancing revenue collection in Kisumu County with the recent establishment of the Kisumu County Revenue Board,” said Governor Anyang Nyong’o during a meeting with KRA Commissioner General Humphrey Wattanga in his office.
In the 2023/24 fical year, the county expects to raise Ksh 2.3 billion in local revenues to fund its Ksh 13.7 billion budget.
Commissioner General Humphrey Wattanga said KRA intends to support the county through capacity building and aligning their tax processes.
“KRA will also partner with the county to identify and activate various revenue streams and tap them into the revenue basket. The Authority will participate in planning, forecasting of revenue targets, monitoring and accounting for revenue collected,” said KRA.
In nine months of FY2022/23 to March, data from the Controller of Budget indicates that Kisumu County collected a total of Ksh 823.6 million from its own sources of revenue which is 5.3pc more than Ksh 784.2 million collected over the same period a year earlier.
However this was only 46.7pc of the annual target which the new partnership seeks to address through a review of its revenue processes, technology adoption and cashlite payments which will boost tax compliance and seal revenue loopholes.
Prof Nyongo further projected revenue collection to grow after the implementation cashlite payment platform and the partnership with Safaricom in implementation of tax system.
Additionally, KRA will also support the county in realization of the Greening Kisumu Initiative.
This is after the governor pledged to allocate KRA five hectares of land in Mambo Leo area, where the Authority will plant trees and set up Micro Small and Medium Enterprises (MSME) help desk to support the business community in the area to uphold compliance.
