SPEAKER M.ENKHBOLD MEETS IMF REPRESENTATIVES

Ulaanbaatar/MONTSAME/On February 5, Parliament Speaker M.Enkhbold met with a delegation led by Geoff Gottlieb, head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) Staff Team, and Neil Saker, head of the IMF Representative Office in Mongolia. To begin the meeting, Speaker M.Enkhbold said that the 2017 was a Year we made much effort to end the economic downturn and thanked the IMF for cooperating with Mongolia on this matter. He said, “Within the framework of implementing the Extended Fund Facility, a personal income tax increased from 10 to 25 percent in four brackets and retirement age raised. The issues attracted much criticism from public. In response to our request to change the decision, the IMF had a positive approach and agreed to reconsider. As a result, the Parliament approved the Bills to amend the Law on Personal Income and the Law on Pensions and Benefits provided by the Social Insurance Fund, and related parliamentary resolutions last week. With the amendments, the marginal tax brackets are revoked to flat tax rate of 10 percent. “Mongolia’s economic growth was at 5.8 percent as of third quarter of 2017. I hope it to be around 4.9 percent as of the end of 2017. This is an example of positive changes produced by a bilateral cooperation between Mongolian government and the IMF,” he added. In turn, Geoff Gottlieb underlined, “The IMF’s support to Mongolian government in implementing the Extended Fund Facility arrangement aims at improving Mongolia’s budget and fiscal policy, stop economic downturn and create a sustainable growth. Thanks to effective implementation of right policies by the Mongolian Parliament and Government, the foreign currency reserve increased and budget deficit declined. But Mongolia’s economy is very changeable; therefore it is important to maintain this positive change for the nearest 1-2 years and build a strong immunity against possible further complication.” He also requested the Speaker to pay attention on a need to adopt amendments of laws on taxation and combating money laundering in near future. In the end of the meeting, Geoff Gottlieb mentioned about a necessity to take substantial measures in regard with Mongolia’s lower ranking according to the assessment of Asia/Pacific Group (APG) of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF). He asked the Parliament Speaker for rendering support to the Financial Regulatory Committee of Mongolia to tackle this issue. M.Unurzul