Launched at COP28 in November 2023 and co-chaired by Barbados, France and Kenya, the International Tax Task Force brings member countries together to explore feasible, scaleable and sensible options for climate levies. These levies can be implemented to help the world fulfill Paris Agreement commitments.
The key aim of the task force is to foster political will around options for progressive levies to support climate and development action, and to bring together coalitions of willing countries to become front runners for implementing specific progressive tax options.
The task force will help ensure all industries and people contribute more to financing the fight against climate change, based on the pollution they produce, while bringing equitable climate justice to our current financial system. The task force is open to participation from countries around the world, and will consult with experts across disciplines.
The task force will conclude its work at COP30 in 2025, with an announcemnet by its co-chairs on options for implementing progressive international levies.
The International Tax Task Force is mandated to explore the impact of a range of levies to finance development, nature and the fight against climate change, including:
On 17 April, the task force launched impact studies to look at specific levies
to carefully consider their potential based on the following criteria:
The International Tax Task Force is a hub for coalitions of countries to come together to explore how to implement progressive tax options to generate new sources of urgently-needed climate and development finance.
The task force was officially launched at COP28 in Dubai in 2023 by France, Kenya, and Barbados.
The task force will focus on fostering political will and creating coalitions of willing countries to advance various options for international taxes.
It will look at options that have the potential to mobilize finance at scale while bringing more climate justice and fairness to our current financial system, by ensuring the most polluting industries (fossil fuel extraction, aviation, shipping and financial services) and people contribute to financing the fight against climate change and inequalities.
By 2030, developing countries excluding China must mobilize USD $2.4 trillion of public revenues each year to ensure they remain on track to meet the objectives of the Paris Agreement. Implementing global climate taxes would provide a sustainable and predictable source of revenue to support their transition, and that is why this initiative can play a crucial role in a just transition to net zero.
We must ensure that our global financial system better reflects the current needs of society, rather than those rooted in the mid-20th century when it was first established. Many heavily polluting industries have been historically protected from taxes and haven’t paid their fair share in our collective work to transition to a net-zero economy. We are providing them with a means and opportunity to do so.
Target sectors could include major contributors to greenhouse gas emissions, such as oil and gas companies, heavy industries, aviation, and maritime shipping, as well as the financial sector.
There is the precedent of the Unitaid airline levy, where countries from around the world (such as Mali, Mauritius, Chile, Brazil, Korea and France) have been using the tax proceeds to fill a particular gap in global health spending (paying for a mechanism to squash drug prices). On average, low-income countries that participate in this airline tax scheme receive 10 times more than what they pay into it. For this reason, many NGOs and think tanks that support the V20 and the Bridgetown Initiative are also supporting the International Tax Task Force.
There are no specific criteria to join the task force. Countries joining only have to show that they are politically willing to support one or several of the taxation options put on the table and be willing to help push the tax agenda whenever possible to adopt these new taxes in a fair and equitable way that will raise as many additional resources as possible.
The potential revenue will be explored in detail in a rigorous research and consultation phase, and through specific impact studies into each tax option.
Existing research has shown that levies could raise:
ECF manages the Secretariat of the International Tax Task Force to support the country co-chairs and members.
The Secretariat is co-led by Laurence Tubiana and another high-level figure from another region.
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