South Africa is considering imposing a 20% tax on online gambling to curb its rapid growth and address related social harms.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cDue to the surge in online gambling and its impact on society, it is proposed that a 20% tax is applied on gross gambling revenue from online betting, including interactive gambling,\u201d the National Treasury said in its discussion paper published on Tuesday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
While the proposed tax could generate about R10 billion in additional revenue, its main purpose is to \u201cdiscourage problem and pathological gambling and their ill effects,\u201d the Treasury said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The proposal seeks to address the steep rise in online gambling in South Africa, driven by widespread smartphone use and deepening economic hardship in a country with one of the world\u2019s highest unemployment rates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The trend has intensified calls for the government to establish a stronger regulatory framework to manage the industry\u2019s growth and limit its social impact.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Data from the National Gambling Board show that about R1.5 trillion was wagered in South Africa\u2019s gambling industry in the 2024\u201325, nearly one-third more than the previous financial year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Gambling participation rose to 65.7% by end-2023, from 30.6% in 2017, with the National Lottery and online sports betting the most popular forms. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Most gamblers were young adults aged 25 to 34, while Mpumalanga, the Western Cape, and Gauteng provinces accounted for more than 80% of total turnover.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The move mirrors global trends. The UK taxes remote gaming at 21% of gross profit, and is consolidating remote levies, and New Zealand introduced a 12% offshore duty on online gambling profits.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Other measures under consideration include requiring local online betting operators to register and provide the nation\u2019s tax agency with the same information they currently submit to provincial gambling boards for revenue collection.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThis should ease administration and industry compliance,\u201d the Treasury said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
South Africa is considering imposing a 20% tax on online gambling to curb its rapid growth and address related social harms.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":59,"featured_media":797366,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[20376,3796,14077],"class_list":["post-844558","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-government","tag-national-gambling-board","tag-national-treasury","tag-new-zealand"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/844558","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/59"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=844558"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/844558\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":844559,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/844558\/revisions\/844559"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/797366"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=844558"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=844558"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=844558"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}