TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - The Finance Ministry's Tax Directorate General said that some 58 million people who run micro, small and medium businesses have not paid their taxes. The ministry's data showed that, so far, only 2 million out of 60 million MSME actors are listed as taxpayers who have paid their taxes.

"I am trying to find those who are not registered. We won't do anything to them, but, let's evolve together," the ministry's tax director general Suryo Utomo said in Jakarta, February 18, when attending the 'Grow with Google' event at the National Library.

The government has cut the imposed income tax (PPh) for MSMEs from 1 percent to 0.5 percent since August 2018. The purpose is to boost MSME performances and eventually raise tax revenues.

In 2019, the Tax DG managed to collect Rp1,545 trillion in taxes, which was 86.5 percent of the target.

A number of efforts are made by the Tax DG to boost the number of taxpaying MSMEs. One of those measures is through cooperation with Google. Later, Google's business learning app, Google Primary, will provide information about taxes for SMEs.

Suryo said that the Tax DG continues to improve its services to become more user-friendly and IT-based. A number of regulations are also being prepared through the Omnibus Law to make paying taxes an easy task.

Fajar Pebrianto