the country’s development endeavour. To address this concern, key reforms are also being undertaken in tax policy and administration. Such reform has included reorganising the Ministry of Revenue and replacing it with a new autonomous body – the Revenue and Customs Authority – implementation of a national Taxpayer Identification Number (TIN); the introduction of the presumptive tax scheme in order to address the hard -to -tax group; computerising tax administration, and conducting comprehensive tax education to enhance taxpayers’ compliance. The reforms have yielded significant improvement in domestic revenue performance collection in the recent past even though a number of challenges remain. These include the large size of the informal sector and tax payers who do not maintain adequate books of account and/or understate their incomes, corruption, and limited human capacity for supervision. XXVII. Another challenge is the need to promote the strengthening and growth of financial Institutions. Even though the number of private banks, bank branches and microfinance institutions continue to grow, the observed low level of financial deepening in the country is indicative of the need for further financial sector reform. XXVIII. In the light of all this, the government acknowledges the need to spur economic growth further; give more emphasis to agriculture and agro-based industries, provide the necessary support to private sector investment, micro and smallenterprises (MSE) and microfinance, increase revenue mobilisation, and maintain a lid on government domestic borrowing. F. Corporate Governance XXIX. As in many other African countries, the concept of corporate governance has just been introduced and is in its infancy. There is currently no national code on corporate governance. The Commercial Code of 1960 is the dominant legal instrument and it is undergoing revision and modernisation. There are efforts to improve the framework under which corporations operate and that will contribute to improve corporate governance. In particular, efforts are ongoing to establish a standardised mechanism for accounting, develop a set of chart of accounting for SMEs and the establishment of a National Accountants and Auditors Board (NAAB). So far, financial accountability is limited by the absence of national accounting and auditing standards. Ethiopia also does not have any specific structure, such as an Institute of Directors, that focuses on promoting basic corporate governance principles and training stakeholders XXX. The total number of registered businesses stood at 82,602 in 2008. Information on firms’ distribution by size, sector or geographical location is not available even if there is a consensus that over 60 percent of corporations are located in Addis Ababa. - 29 -