The landscape of Flanders is characterized by a high level of diversity within a relatively small area: in a mere matter of hours, you can take a road trip from the coastline to several art cities and into the forests of the Limburg Province. Complement this with a highly competent and multilingual technical staff and it’s not hard to see why every year, hundreds of production projects large and small are shot here.

Since 2004, companies investing in film production in Belgium – and Flanders as a region – benefit from a significant tax deduction. Both a cultural and an economic measure, the tax shelter’s incentive comes in the form of a reduction of taxable profits. It is open to Belgian productions as well as international co-productions with Belgium-based companies. Highlighting the measure’s success: between 2004 and 2016, there has been more than EUR 1.5 billion worth of tax shelter investments.

• How does it work?

  Put simply, the tax shelter offers a tax exemption of 310% on the sum that an organization invested in Belgian audiovisual work. There are some conditions, such as the fact that the investment cannot exceed 50% of the filming budget.
   

• Who can benefit from the tax shelter?

  Flanders’ tax shelter benefits both the producer and the investor. The first is offered a very attractive way to finance their projects, and the second obtains significant tax exemption through a virtually risk-free investment. The region of Flanders and the Belgian state, for their part, enjoy increased economic activity and employment.
   

• Works that qualify for the tax shelter include:

  • European audiovisual works, including fiction, documentary and animated films or series intended for television, web series, and virtual reality productions.

  • International productions, such as fiction films, documentaries, animated films or virtual reality productions intended for cinema. 

By combining the abovementioned mechanisms – the Belgian tax shelter, the Screen Flanders regional fund, and VAF – producers can finance up to two thirds of their Belgian expenses.