The Organisation for Economic Cooperation & Development announced today that Anguilla, St. Kitts and Nevis and St. Vincent and the Grenadines have become the 23rd, 24th and 25th jurisdictions to move into the [category of jurisdictions](http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/50/0/43606256.pdf) that are considered to have substantially implemented the standard since April 2009. Since that time almost 370 agreements have been signed or brought up to the internationally agreed tax standard.
During the past week Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines and Anguilla, an overseas territory of the United Kingdom, have signed a total of 14 tax information exchange agreements. These signings bring the total number of agreements signed by each jurisdiction to at least 12 that meet the internationally agreed tax standard.
St. Kitts and Nevis and St. Vincent and the Grenadines today signed agreements with Faroe Islands, Finland, Greenland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden. These agreements add to agreements St. Kitts and Nevis had already signed with Australia, Monaco, The Netherlands, The Netherlands Antilles, Aruba, United Kingdom, Denmark, Belgium, New Zealand and Liechtenstein, bringing their total to 16 agreements. St. Vincent and the Grenadines has now signed 16 agreements that meet the standard, including its existing agreements with Australia, Austria, Denmark, the Netherlands, Aruba, Liechtenstein, Belgium, Ireland, the United Kingdom and New Zealand.
Anguilla, which signed an agreement with Australia and Germany on 19 March, had previously signed 11 other agreements – including agreements with the United Kingdom, Ireland, the Netherlands, New Zealand and the seven Nordic economies – and this signing brings their total to 13 agreements that meet the internationally agreed tax standard.
The OECD notes that each of these jurisdictions is a member of the [Global Forum on Transparency and Exchange of Information for Tax Purposes](http://www.oecd.org/site/0,3407,en_21571361_43854757_1_1_1_1_1,00.html) and has agreed to participate in a peer review of their laws and practices in this area. According to the schedule of reviews published by the Global Forum, they will undergo reviews of their legal and regulatory framework for exchange of information in 2011 and reviews of their information exchange practices in 2013.
Jeffrey Owens, Director of the OECD’s Centre for Tax Policy and Administration said, “*We continue to see a great deal of progress as jurisdictions move to sign agreements. With Anguilla, St. Kitts and Nevis and St. Vincent and the Grenadines now reaching this benchmark, almost all of the Caribbean jurisdictions have substantially implemented the standard, and we will be working with the remaining jurisdictions – both in the Caribbean and elsewhere – to encourage them to follow this trend and provide whatever assistance we can. The real test will come with the peer review process, when the Global Forum can evaluate the quality of these agreements and the extent of the implementation of the standards in practice.”*