South Korea

Doubling support to DRM in partner countries

In 2017, Korea’s support was provided mostly through bilateral channels in the form of technical assistance focusing on tax policy planning and customs tax assistance. Least developed countries (LDC) and lower middle-income countries (LMIC) were the major partner countries. Since 2015, the support for domestic revenue mobilisation has been increasing, with some fluctuation being observed on the disbursement level. The number of projects supporting domestic revenue mobilisation has doubled between 2016 and 2017. While Korea is striving to further increase its DRM support as a commitment to the Addis Tax Initiative, uncontrollable external factors that may delay or cancel planned projects should be taken into account.

Policy coherence for development and outlook

Despite Korea’s efforts to double DRM support, it is challenging to evaluate the likelihood of doubling DRM support by 2020 because Korea’s official development assistance (ODA) is based on the needs and demands of the partner countries. Still, the level of commitments for DRM support has significantly increased and Korea will strive to meet the ATI commitments.