Taxes on petrol and petrol prices in Vietnam are lower than in other countries in the world

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Mr. Pham Dinh Thi.

Mr. Thi said that the Ministry of Finance had submitted the above content to the Government to report to the National Assembly, with adjustment for various types of taxes. According to Mr. Thi, at present, Vietnam's tax system is similar to international practices.

For example, when petroleum is imported into Vietnam, it will attract import tax, special consumption tax, and value added tax. In addition, petroleum attracts environmental protection tax (3,000 vnd per liter), and deduction for the Price Stabilization Fund (300 vnd per liter).

According to calculations of the Ministry of Finance, at present, the proportion of taxes in the base price of RON 92 petrol is 41.5%; of diesel is 2.5%; and of oil is 11.4%.

In order to assert that the above proportion is not as high as the statistics covered by some press, he gave a series of statistics of foreign countries’ taxes on petroleum. Specifically, the proportion of taxes on petrol prices in Korea is 70.3%, which includes a tax of 35.4% on petrol, 30% on oil, Value Added Tax and other taxes; the proportion of taxes on the petrol price in Laos is 56% which includes an import tax of 15%, a special consumption tax of 20%, a value-added tax of 10%, and a toll of 8%.

In particular, the common value-added tax of 10% in Vietnam is one of the lowest taxes in the world, while VAT is 15% in Cambodia, 17% in China, 19% in Italy, 19% in France, and 25% in Denmark.

Regarding the retail price of petroleum, the Tax Policy Department said: According to the statistics from a prestigious international magazine, Vietnam's retail petrol price is $US 0.74 per liter. Meanwhile China's retail price is $US 0.94 per liter; Laos’ retail price is $US 1.09 per liter. In Asia, Singapore’s retail price of petrol is $US 1.34 per liter; Thailand’s retail price is $US 0.91 per liter; the Philippines’ retail price of petrol is $US 0.89 per liter; Hong Kong’s retail price of petrol is $US 1.86 per liter and Taiwan’s retail price of petrol is $US 0.75 per liter.

For the sale price in countries both importing and domestically producing petroleum like Vietnam, Germany is selling petroleum at $US 1.45 per liter; Belgium with $US 1.44 per liter; France with $US 1.44 per liter; and Finland with $US 1.51 per liter.

PetroVietnam’s contribution to state budget falls on low oil prices The government has told the company to increase production after crude oil prices plummeted 33.4 percent.

On the basis of the above figures, Mr. Pham Dinh Thi reconfirmed: “There are no overlapped taxes on petroleum, because petroleum and many items are subject to multiple taxes the same as other countries in the world. In fact, the proportion of taxes in the retail petrol price is not high in Vietnam.