SUBIC BAY

Subic Freeport tax collections continue six-year uptrend
Feb 06, 2015

SUBIC BAY FREEPORT - Tax collections in this free port by both the Bureau of Customs (BoC) and the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) continue to break annual records in the last six years, providing concrete proof that the free port economy is steadily growing.

Subic Bay Metropolitan Authority (SBMA) Chairman and Administrator Roberto Garcia said that customs collections and income taxes from Subic-registered companies and their employees "never faltered, and mirrored the overall uptick in the Philippine economy in the past few years."

"This only shows that there has been continuous growth among business locators here in terms of earnings, as well as employment," Garcia added.

According to data submitted by the BoC and the BIR offices here, their combined collection performance began to improve in 2009 when both collecting agencies​
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netted P5.6 billion, compared to P5.3 billion in 2008, or a growth of 6.18 percent.

In 2010, this increased by 19.25 percent to P6.7 billion; by 8.14 percent to P7.2 billion in 2011; by 5.42 percent to P7.6 billion in 2012; and by 66.28 percent to P12.7 billion in 2013.

Last year, the two agencies collected a total of P17.1 billion worth of taxes from January to December, putting the 2014 collections at 35 percent more than that in the previous year.

Out of the 2014 combined collections, the BoC contributed P15.3 billion, a record that was 36 percent high​er than its P11.2-billion customs tally in 2013.

BOC also registered in 2014 non-cash collections of P2.2 billion from government-to-government transactions.

Meanwhile, the BIR here collected a total of P1.8 billion, accounted for income taxes worth P1.4 billion, value-added taxes worth P381 million, percentage taxes worth P1.8 million, and other taxes worth P29.5 million.

Garcia said that a portion of the BIR collection here is the five-percent corporate tax computed from the annual gross income of Subic-registered locator companies.

He added​ that the SBMA remits to three percent out of the five percent corporate taxes to the national treasury, and releases the other two percent to neighboring communities in the form of local government unit (LGU) shares.

Late last week, the SBMA made available revenue shares worth P105 million to the eight LGUs adjacent to and affected by the operation of the Subic Bay Freeport Zone. (30)

News 2015