INCREASED and sustained focus of the authorities concerned on revenue collection is producing positive results, which augurs well for the economy as crippling dependence on foreign loans is at the roots of the problems facing the country and its people. The strategy of the present Government for tax collection is paying dividends and that is why, while chairing a meeting to review the economic situation, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif expressed satisfaction over the increasing fiscal space, which will, hopefully, allow the Government to provide meaningful relief to the inflation-ridden people.
There are reasons to believe that taxation efforts will receive a boost with the end-to-end digitization of the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) that is expected to be completed by the end of December as directed by the Prime Minister. Various reports and studies clearly indicated that the country will not need to add the burden of taxation on the existing tax-payers if loopholes in the system are plugged and all sectors and classes of the society pay their taxes honestly. The computerization of the FBR and its linkage with sectors known for tax evasion will help identify the leakages and it will be up to the FBR personnel to make evaders pay their due taxes as taxation on the existing tax-payers, especially salaried class and the corporate sector, has reached saturation point. In this regard, the meeting was told that the digitization of FBR’s value chain will be completed by March next year. The video analytics of the sugar industry has already been completed. The Prime Minister called for early installation of the cement industrys video analytics system. He was told that work on system design for digital invoices has been completed and a mobile phone application for the digital invoicing of small businesses would be ready by the end of this month. Successful implementation of these measures will contribute significantly to the cherished objective of documentation of the economy and realizing maximum tax potential of different industries and businesses. It is also a matter of satisfaction that as a result of the crackdown on smuggling the smuggled fuel and reduction in petrol and diesel prices, the sale of petroleum products had reached 1.58 million metric tons — the highest ever during the last 25 months. This indicates not only revival of the energy market but also additional income for the Government in the form of taxation on petroleum products. As part of the strategy to curb sale of smuggled petrol, it is proposed to digitize petrol pumps across the country and monitor sales through SIM-based technology at petrol pumps. There is also a plan to develop a GIS mobile application to locate illegal petrol pumps and to bind oil marketing companies to provide real-time updates on the mobile application. However, it may be pointed out that the total volume of the smuggling is estimated at Rs. 750 billion and apart from measures to check smuggling of petroleum products worth Rs. 396 billion, the authorities concerned should also devote attention to curb smuggling of other items like tobacco, tyres, fabrics, vehicles, tea, auto parts, betel nuts and mobile phones. Apart from increased revenue collection, other economic indicators are also positive and these would surely improve further as the Government is determined to implement the reforms process to put the economy on sound footings. This resolve of the Government was reiterated by Finance Minister Muhammad Aurangzeb during his speech at the launch of the first sustainability-based online platform of ESG Sustain Pakistan under the auspices of the Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP) on Thursday. However, there should be trickle-down effect of the increased fiscal space and improvement in economic indicators in terms of relief to the masses.
