Association and EBA appeals to the Minister of Finance of Georgia

The Association of Georgian Virtual Zone Persons constantly cooperates with government agencies and the most authoritative business community representatives, such as The European Business Association (EBA).

EBA unites over 100 Georgian and European companies. The organization’s vision is that doing business in Georgia will be the same as doing business in Europe.

EBA and the Association of Georgian Virtual Zone Persons appealed to the Minister of Finance of Georgia, Mr. Lasha Khutsishvili. We would like to draw his attention to one of the problematic issues that IT companies with a Virtual Zone Person (VZP) Status face due to the recent actions of the Revenue Service of Georgia – penalizing dozens of IT companies with a VZP status operating in Georgia.

As it is already well known, companies that were once proud to be operating in and from Georgia are now penalized by the Revenue Service. With this, Georgia does not send a positive signal to the broader international IT sector, which might consider investing in a Georgian IT presence. No investor denies that any entity should pay taxes unconditionally, and any investor does not avoid this. However, this is only when it is clearly and fairly provided by the law and from the moment of the establishment of clear criteria onwards, and not retroactively, which is not the case with companies with the VZP. Unfortunately, the proceedings in all instances of the Ministry of Finance were resolved to the detriment of businesses.

Considering all the difficulties, the Association with its partners sends a strong signal to the Government of Georgia with reasoned arguments, and European partners support all these arguments, and they do not hide their dissatisfaction with this topic. 

European partners do everything to achieve fairness in relation to companies. Consequently, Associations express their readiness to take an active part in developing processes to overcome the challenges faced by the business sector through joint dialogue and cooperation.

You can see the official letter to the Minister of Finance of Georgia, Mr. Lasha Khutsishvili on this link.