The international development secretary Douglas Alexander has unveiled a white paper on country-by-country reporting, in a further move to address perceived tax dodging by multinational companies. The paper calls for further discussions on tax reforms by the UK and its partners to see if it can 'offer an effective and suitable means of advancing the tax agenda'. Country-by-country reporting would require companies that trade internationally to report their profits and taxes in each jurisdiction they operate in. Chrisitian Aid said that the move would prevent companies from manipulating their accounts to reduce tax liability, and would reduce dependence on aid. The charity claims that developing countries lose out on $160bn (£99bn) a year in lost tax revenue, and would benefit greatly from the reforms, which could save the lives of '350,000 children under the age of five annually'. Melanie Ward, Christian Aid senior political adviser, said: 'This is the first official government policy statement on the issue We are also very pleased that the white paper accepted that tax revenues in the developing world will provide an eventual exit from aid dependence.' She added: 'The report also pointed out that the tax system in developing countries is being undermined by international banking secrecy and the use of tax havens, which is something groups such as Christian Aid has long said. But Ward points out that the 'true test' of the government's commitment to the tax agenda will be whether it 'can lead the rest of the world towards a new global agreement that enables poor countries to recover much of their missing money from tax havens'.