Taxes, and more generally the public revenue system, have provided the fiscal backbone for the remarkable development of Asia and the Pacific over the past few decades. However, growing public spending requirements for infrastructure, social and environmental investment for implementation of the SDGs, and the region’s unprecedented urbanization, call for strengthening fiscal positions. Additionally, globalization and cross-border business activities have created new challenges for national tax administrations. In response to these new trends and the needs of Asia-Pacific countries, the idea to create a new regional tax forum was brought up at ESCAP’s 70th Commission Session in 2014 and further developed at a number of regional events. The proposed tax forum would seek to address the key issues that are most pertinent to the region, but yet to be addressed by existing international and regional tax cooperation mechanisms. This paper highlights the rationale of the proposed forum, discusses five potential focal areas for the forum and suggests a working blueprint for the forum.