Local manufacturers seek FIRS understanding for tax exemptions on raw materials

To address concerns relating to multiple taxation as well as high cost of production, local producers in the country have sought understanding with the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) on the issue of Value Added Tax (VAT) exemption on some raw materials.

According to the manufacturers, the exemptions will aid growth in the real sector, given the role of manufacturing in the industrial and economic development of our country and the concomitant effect on employment generation, technology acquisition and wealth creation.

Acknowledging earlier interventions in the exemptions given on biscuit and raw materials for the production of diapers, the President of Manufacturers Association of Nigeria (MAN), Mansur Ahmed explained that similar interventions will aid activities in the real sector.
Besides, the FIRS disclosed that the non-oil sector contributed about 54 per cent of the N5.32 trillion revenue it generated in 2018.

FIRS Chairman, Babatunde Fowler, during an interactive forum on Tax Matters with the MAN in Lagos, yesterday, noted that the manufacturing sector and other sectors under non-oil sector have overtaken the oil sector in contributing immensely in terms of revenue generation to the nation’s economic growth.

The FIRS boss pledged the agency’s commitment and support to engage more with the private sector, especially manufacturers, in its operation, assessment and development of the nation’s economy.

Ahmed on the other hand, said the interactive session was timely and would help to resolve some challenges that manufacturers are encountering in their relationship with FIRS, pointing out that the meeting would also provide the platform for manufacturers to fully ventilate their experiences.

He assured that the association shares the view of FIRS, which is part of the transformation initiatives of the present administration that seeks to create a more prosperous economy through diversification of the economy and government revenue away from oil dominated foreign earnings to a more predictable sources that have the potential to accelerate the country’s economic growth.

“MAN appreciates what FIRS has been doing especially in the last three years; given the fact that revenue from taxes has significantly improved and fast becoming another credible source of our central government’s yearly budget funding, thereby minimizing the vagaries and volatility associated with oil prices at the international market,” he said.

He however recommended that government should widen the tax net rather than increasing the tax rate thereby moving up taxes and levies which are usually borne by the narrow tax compliant segments of the populace, especially the corporate entities; majority of whom are manufacturers and whose internal system cannot permit avoidance or evasion of tax.