A friendly visit from the taxman can build trust, or break it. Tanzania shows why

Dar es Salaam — Revenue authorities across sub-Saharan Africa are moving from audits and penalties towards education and door-to-door visits. Auditing every small trader is expensive and unpopular, while trust seems cheaper and more durable. A new trial in Tanzania suggests it is not that simple.

Researchers worked with the Tanzania Revenue Authority in December 2022, surveying 1,210 small businesses across 119 urban and peri-urban wards. In randomly chosen wards, a tax official sat in on the interview as a silent observer. They then compared the answers with tax records covering about 40,000 firms.

The same visit, opposite effects

• In wealthier regions such as Dar es Salaam, Mwanza and Mbeya, firms reported more trust than those who had no official present.
• In the poorest zones, including Mtwara, Lindi, Kigoma and Katavi, they reported much less.
• Trust and compliance moved together. In the poorest zones, firms were less likely to pay in the following quarter and paid less overall. In wealthier areas, compliance moved the other way, though more weakly.

The authors explain that where people already deal with the state regularly, a visit can feel like part of a two-way relationship. Where the state appears only when it wants something, the same visit reads very differently.

Five lessons for tax authorities

1. Diagnose trust before scaling outreach. 2. Visibly separate help from enforcement. 3. In low-trust areas, lead with services such as fixing a registration error. 4. Track trust and compliance together. 5. Pair outreach with information on public spending, rights and complaint channels.

The authors say the turn to softer outreach is broadly well placed, but its design matters.

Source: The Conversation, 20 October 2026.