Incentivos fiscales en las leyes nacionales de inversión

The report analyzes 105 national investment laws in EMDEs, finding that 67.6% explicitly provide incentives, with tax incentives being the most dominant. It highlights a systemic gap in coordination between Investment Promotion Agencies (IPAs), which typically lead the design and administration of these laws, and Ministries of Finance (MFs), which are often marginalized in the legal text. This fragmentation leads to risks of revenue loss, inefficient resource allocation, and exposure to Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) claims. The document notes a trend toward centralizing tax incentives into unified legal frameworks to improve transparency and fiscal discipline, as seen in Ghana and Honduras.

• National investment laws are a primary tool for granting incentives in EMDEs; of the 105 laws analyzed, 71 (67.6%) explicitly provide incentives, a trend particularly strong in Africa and Asia where many such laws were enacted in the last decade.
• Tax incentives are the most prevalent type of incentive in investment laws, appearing in 94% of laws that offer incentives. Tax exemptions and reductions are the most frequently used instruments.
• There is a significant institutional imbalance in the governance of these incentives: Investment Promotion Agencies (IPAs) typically drive the drafting and administration of investment laws, while Ministries of Finance (MFs) have a limited role in the legal texts.
• Many countries suffer from a fragmentation of incentive regimes, where tax benefits coexist across multiple legal frameworks (investment laws, tax codes, and special economic zones) without explicit provisions to prevent 'stacking' or accumulation.
• The use of national investment laws to grant incentives increases a state's exposure to Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) risks, as changes to these incentives can be challenged as treaty or law violations.
• Monitoring and evaluation mechanisms are weak and inconsistent; fewer than half of the investment laws that grant tax incentives explicitly require periodic reviews, and even fewer require independent audits.
• Data on foregone tax revenues (tax expenditures) is typically disconnected from investment policy-making, as these reports are usually produced by tax authorities and not systematically shared with or integrated into the work of investment agencies.
• Some countries are implementing reforms to centralize tax incentives under unified legal frameworks to reduce fragmentation and improve transparency, such as Ghana's Exemptions Act of 2022 and Honduras's Tax Justice Law.

APA

Lago, J. D. R. (2026). Incentivos fiscales en las leyes nacionales de inversión. International Institute for Sustainable Development. https://www.iisd.org/system/files/2026-07/tax-incentives-investment-laws-es.pdf

Chicago

Lago, Josefina del Rosario. Incentivos fiscales en las leyes nacionales de inversión. International Institute for Sustainable Development, 2026. https://www.iisd.org/system/files/2026-07/tax-incentives-investment-laws-es.pdf.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |last1=Lago |first1=Josefina del Rosario |title=Incentivos fiscales en las leyes nacionales de inversión |publisher=International Institute for Sustainable Development |date=April 2026 |url=https://www.iisd.org/system/files/2026-07/tax-incentives-investment-laws-es.pdf |access-date=23 October 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{lago2026incentivos, author = {Lago, Josefina del Rosario}, title = {{Incentivos fiscales en las leyes nacionales de inversión}}, institution = {International Institute for Sustainable Development}, year = {2026}, month = apr, url = {https://www.iisd.org/system/files/2026-07/tax-incentives-investment-laws-es.pdf}, urldate = {2026-10-23}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }