Hanoi, May 4 (IANS): Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee Wednesday said countries need to expedite the process of signing agreements that will allow them to swap information on tax defaulters.

To avoid tax in their respective countries, people park their undeclared funds in jurisdictions where regulations are lax and which provide facilities to conceal such assets.

Such countries or jurisdictions, have in the past cited banking or privacy laws to avoid sharing data on tax defaulters with other nations.

"G20 has declared that tackling non-cooperative jurisdictions will also be one of its priorities. There is an urgent need to make much more progress on exchange of tax information," Mukherjee said at a luncheon meeting on G-20 issues at the annual general meeting of the Asian Development Bank here.

India has already signed tax information exchange agreements with the Bahamas, Bermuda, the British Virgin Islands and the Isle of Man.