About AOTCA

History of AOTCA

The Asia-Oceania Tax Consultants' Association - AOTCA - was established in 1992 by 10 tax professional organizations in the area and started its activities in 1993.

The Founding Members

  • All Pakistan Tax Bar Association
  • CPA Australia
  • Hong Kong Institute of Certified Public Accountants
  • Institute of Chartered Accountants of Australia (withdrawal later)
  • Japan Federation of Certified Public Tax Accountants' Associations
  • Korean Association of Certified Public Tax Accountants
  • Malaysian Institute of Taxation
  • Tax-Accountancy Association Union of Chinese Taipei
  • Taxation Institute of Australia
  • Tax Management Association of the Philippines

The foundation of AOTCA was attributed to the existence of the Confédération Fiscale Européenne (CFE), the international organization for tax advisors in the European Communities with a long history of 49 years. Over the years tax professionals doing businesses in the Asian and Oceanic regions had been strongly conscious of the necessity that the same international professional body as CFE would exist in the area. On 6 November 1992 the inaugural meeting took place in Tokyo with the attendance of the representatives of each founding member organization from 8 countries and regions.
Since then, embracing new members year by year, AOTCA has grown to be with 20 national organizations including 2 associate members. The jurisdictions to which the AOTCA members belong count as many as 16 ; Australia, Bangladesh, China, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Mongolia, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, the Philippines, Taiwan and Thailand.
For further information on the member organizations, please see AOTCA members.

In 2002, to commemorate the 10th anniversary of its foundation, AOTCA organized the first International Convention in Kyoto, in which s0me 1000 persons domestic and overseas participated. The second International Convention was held in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia in November 2007. With the main theme “Tax Challenges in a Globalized Environment”, the world-wide guest speakers delivered presentations on various current tax issues.

Another development of AOTCA in its history is the promotion of cooperative relationships with CFE and SGATAR (Study Group on Asian Tax Administration and Research), a forum for tax administration. Since 2005, AOTCA and those organizations send representatives to respective annual meeting on reciprocal basis for exchanging information. AOTCA is trying to enhance recognition of significant roles of tax professionals through these channels.

Purposes

The purposes of AOTCA are:

  1. to promote mutual understanding and cooperation among the organizations;
  2. to contribute to the expansion of the component members' businesses related to taxation and its related areas; and
  3. to promote friendship among the members.

Activities

In order to achieve the purposes AOTCA carries out various activities, major of which are as follows.
AOTCA convenes a general council meeting annually and a general meeting bi-annually in collaboration with a host organization. At the time of convening meetings, it holds technical sessions and discussions on local and international tax matters, investment, etc.

The AOTCA meetings have been held in the following cities:

November 1992
Tokyo, Japan (Inaugural meeting)
November 1993
Sydney, Australia
November 1994
Tokyo, Japan
November 1995
Seoul, Korea
November 1996
Kyoto, Japan
November 1997
Manila, the Philippines
November 1998
Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
November 1999
Taipei, Chinese Taipei
November 2000
Seoul, Korea
February 2002
Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
November 2002
Kyoto, Japan (1st International Convention also held)
February 2004
Seoul, Korea
November 2004
Karachi, Pakistan
November 2005
Manila, the Philippines
November 2006
Hong Kong, China
November 2007
Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia (2nd International Convention also held)

The future meetings are scheduled in Shanghai, China in 2008 and in Mumbai, India in 2009.

AOTCA publishes two issues of its newsletter, “AOTCA Journal” and “Technical Reports” annually.

Membership

The AOTCA members are: 1) the organizations established in the Asian and Oceanic region; 2) the organizations which include tax professionals such as tax consultants, tax lawyers. etc.; 3) recognized as ones of good standing by general consensus or by domestic law in their own countries/regions.
Please see Article 5 of the Statutes for details.

Officers

  • President / Kinjiro Mori
  • Deputy President / Gil Levy
  • Vice Presidents / Representative of each member organization
  • Secretary General / Hirotaka Ishii
  • Auditors / Younus Rizwani, Harphal Singh Dhillon
  • Honorary Advisors / Teruaki Kataoka, Bang Hyo-sun, David Russell, Rehan Hasan Naqvi, Koo Jong-Tae, Chang Luck, Ahmad Mustapha Ghazali
  • Advisor / Thomas Lee, Michael Dirkis

Past- Presidents / Secretary Generals / Secretariats

President Secretary General Secretariat
1993 - 1996 Teruaki Kataoka Norihisa Maeda Japan Federation of Certified Public Tax Accountants' Associations
1997 - 2000 David Russell, QC Peter Cowdroy
Noel Rowland
Taxation Institute of Australia
2001 - 2004 Koo, Jong-Tae Lee, Yong-Ro
Chang, Luck
Korean Association of Certified Public Tax Accountants
2005 - 2008 Kinjiro Mori Hirotaka Ishii Japan Federation of Certified Public Tax Accountants' Associations