Prohibited, Cigarettes Share Much from Tax

vivanews.com, Friday 2 July 2010

Arinto Tri Wibowo, Agus Dwi Darmawan

Regardless the ‘haram’ (prohibited) labeling by Muhammadiyah and the boycott against Indonesian clove flavored cigarettes in the United States, the amount of tax on the products in June 2010 does not seem to be affected.

According to the Customs and Excise Directorate General, the tax revenue per June 28, 2010 has gone five percent over the target.

“Our statistic indicated that from the target of Rp 29.3 trillion, we have earned Rp 31.03 trillion,” Customs and Excise Director General Thomas Sugijata said at the Finance Ministry office in Friday, July 2.

He also said the tax is the institution’s biggest earning. According to him, the prohibitions have not shown their impact considering the overachievement.

Meanwhile, around 90 percent of customs income was coming from tobacco tax. Out of this year’s total target of Rp 59 trillion, approximately Rp 55 trillion was earned from tobacco tax while the rest was obtained from alcohol, etilalcohol and other types of products.

Sugijata also pointed out that in general, the Customs and Excise Directorate had up to 106.11 excess revenue as of June 28.

In details, other kinds of revenues besides the taxes are imported goods tax, which per June last year made Rp 9.2 trillion, going higher than the target of Rp 7.4 trillion.

“So, until June, we’ve received more than 23.19 percent off the target (123 percent)” Sugijata said.

As for exported goods tax, the target has not been fulfilled because out of Rp 2.7 trillion target, the income was only worth Rp 1.7 trillion or 31.94 percent of the target.

“That’s because of the policies for domestic protection, such as the one for the crude palm oil. It depends on the policy regarding the amount of standard export and tariff determined by other departments. The Customs and Excise Directorate can’t control that”.