During the IMF/World Bank annual meetings in October 2025, a panel discussion was held on 17 October 2025 on digitalisation. The panel included representatives of the administrations of Finland, Brazil and Madagascar who outlined their efforts to digitalise their tax administrations. The participants were Virpi Pikkarainen, Program Director in the Finnish Tax Administration; Juliano Brito da Justa Neves, Undersecretary of Corporate Management, Special Secretary of the Federal Revenue of Brazil; and Ernest Z. Lainkana, the Director General of the Madagascar Customs Administration.
The panel member from Finland explained that digital systems are being used by the tax administration in customer services. Digitalisation has also been introduced to assist targeting for audit selection and to conduct risk management. Digital systems are being used for appeal analysis and for decision letter drafting; and for analysis of large datasets. Work is in progress on the development of an officer support chatbot, to provide support for revenue officials. The Finnish tax administration is aiming to begin work soon on using agentic AI and agent networks.
The panel member from Brazil noted that with effect from 2026 there will be a new VAT system in Brazil with automatic calculation of VAT at each stage and rapid VAT refunds. The digital system will be capable of processing 70 billion records each year. Brazil has used cloud technologies intensely to produce an automated system. The only obligation for taxpayers is to issue the electronic invoice. There will also be an open-source VAT calculator.
In Madagascar, digitalisation was used to achieve more operational efficiency in carrying out fiscal policy. Without effective administrative systems, fiscal policy may have good intentions but does not have the means to implement the required reforms. Digitalisation was used to introduce smart, digital Customs administration and to use enhanced risk assessment. Data was transformed into operational intelligence, and digital systems were used to identify anomalies in Customs declarations. This allowed Customs to focus on high-risk shipments. More than 80% of Customs fraud relates to valuation, and with the help of IT systems Customs officials can compare the declared valuation to market price trends. This demonstrates that digitalisation can be effective for developing countries.
