Difficult economic situation to affect and put great pressure on fiscal policy

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The conference at the Ministry of Finance headquarters

Creating favourable conditions for the business community

The conference was attended by Deputy Minister of Finance Nguyen Duc Chi, Deputy Minister Vo Thanh Hung and leading representatives of departments and agencies under the Ministry.

At the General Departments, there were representatives of the leaders of the General Departments and competent departments and agencies under the General Department.

Representing the General Department of Customs, Mr Hoang Viet Cuong, Deputy Director of the General Department of Customs, said that in the first quarter of 2023, Vietnam recorded US$ 154 billion in trade, down 13.3% year-on-year, of which exports were estimated at US$79 billion, down 11.9% and imports US$75 billion, down 14.7% year-on-year.

According to Mr Hoang Viet Cuong, the decrease in import-export turnover in the first three months of 2023 greatly affects the revenue of the Customs sector. Accordingly, by the end of March 2023, the customs revenue was estimated at VND91,267 billion, reaching 21.5% of the estimate, down 17% year-on-year. This is a large decline in recent years.

It is predicted that the economic situation will be more difficult. Therefore, the General Department of Customs has directed the local customs, especially the eight departments with large revenue, to hold business dialogues and meet businesses in their areas to understand the situation of businesses.

Regarding the solution, Mr Hoang Viet Cuong said the Customs sector would continue to implement the customs sector's directive from the beginning of the year to create favourable conditions for the business community, direct the local customs departments to hold dialogues and meet with some large enterprises to understand their export ability, production and business situation to estimate the customs revenue shortly.

Also, the Customs sector is preparing to issue a decision to rectify administrative discipline in the customs sector, in which 980 violations have been developed instead of 400 previous acts.

Reporting at a conference, Mr Mai Xuan Thanh, Acting Director of the General Department of Taxation, said that in the first three months of the year, the tax revenue reached 31.1% of the estimate, rising 4.6% year-on-year. Of these, 12 of20 revenues and taxes recorded higher results than the estimate (reaching over 28%). However, according to Mr Mai Xuan Thanh, this revenue is not sustainable and shows signs of difficulties in budget collection.

Regarding the law-making, Mr Mai Xuan Thanh said in the first quarter of 2023, the General Department of Taxation reported to the Ministry of Finance to submit to the Government a decree on extending the payment deadline for value-added tax and corporate income tax, personal income tax and land rent; reported to the Ministry to submit to the Prime Minister to promote data sharing to develop e-commerce platforms, combat revenue loss and ensure monetary security.

The conference also noted the reports of units in the Ministry of Finance on the work performed in March and Quarter 1/2023, plans and solutions to implement the tasks in April, and Quarter 2/2023 to complete the assigned task successfully.

Follow, encourage, and support the business community

Addressing the conference, Minister Ho Duc Phoc praised the efforts of the entire sector in Quarter 1, 2023. In the context of the economy facing many difficulties and challenges, units in the finance sector have made efforts, strived and united to overcome difficulties and complete tasks well.

The Minister also said that the documents and bits of advice of the Ministry of Finance had been highly appreciated by the Government, ministries and agencies, contributing to solving issues of concern in a scientific and practical way.

Minister of Finance Ho Duc Phoc delivered a speech at the conference

According to the Minister, the economic situation is still complicated and will affect and put great pressure on the fiscal policy, so it is required that the whole sector must unite and share to complete all assigned tasks successfully.

The Minister requested the units to closely follow the situation of enterprises through budget revenue and expenditure issues, import and export issues, to promptly report to the Ministry's leaders to submit to the Government on the difficulties of enterprises and the economy to propose solutions.

In particular, the Finance sector must give top priority to the law-making work, especially the documents the ministries and agencies ask for opinions on and the documents the Government assigns the Ministry of Finance to implement because this is the basis for assessing the quality of the Ministry's timely coordination and advice on important issues of the country.

At the conference, the Minister also instructed Tax, Customs, Securities...

Accordingly, for the tax sector, the Minister requested to focus on perfecting the global minimum tax; quickly and effectively deploy projects such as the data centre on electronic invoices, electronic invoice management tools, and real estate transfer management software; strengthen the management of domestic e-commerce floors and cross-border e-commerce floors to prevent tax revenue loss; and strictly implement tax refund to avoid tax loss...

In the difficult economic situation, the Minister emphasized that the tax industry must closely follow, encourage and support businesses.

The Minister also requested the Customs sector to manage civil servants strictly and requested them to seriously follow discipline and prevent negative manifestations and harassment of customs officers. The customs sector is also required to soon equip modern machinery and equipment for airports and seaports to ensure conditions for performing assigned tasks, strengthen the fight against smuggling and commercial fraud, and closely monitor import and export turnover to advise the Ministry and Government to make decisions promptly.

Regarding the communication, the Minister suggested that the dissemination work must be one step ahead to raise the awareness of the whole society about the nature of the problems of the customs sector; the units need to proactively forecast the situations that may take place to quickly orient information.