The National Board of Revenue has raised the supplementary duty on soft drinks to 25 per cent from the existing 15 per cent to check tax evasion by energy drink producers, officials of the NBR said. They said that energy drink makers were abusing the existing tax facility given to the soft drink sector. Currently, energy drinks producers have to pay 25 per cent SD while soft drinks makers have to pay 15 per cent at production stage.
Many energy drinks manufacturers have been evading taxes by giving SD at the rate of 15 per cent declaring their products as soft drinks, NBR officials said.
To prevent widespread duty evasion, the NBR made the supplementary duty equal for both soft drinks and energy drinks producers, they said.
The value-added tax wing on Tuesday issued a statutory regulatory order in this connection.
The retail prices of soft drinks are likely to be increased by Tk 11.5 per litre due to increase of SD at production stage of the products.
According to NBR estimate, the government will get around Tk 20 crore in revenue in the last two months (May-June) of the cur
rent fiscal year because of upward revision of SD on soft drinks and by preventing tax evasion by energy drinks producers.
The decision will also remove the confusion in specification of soft drinks and energy drinks by field level tax officials.
The NBR in February issued a guideline on energy drinks by specifying the raw materials and asked field level taxmen to carry out chemical tests of energy drinks to differentiate them from soft drinks and prevent tax evasion by energy drinks makers.
But tax officials found conducting chemical tests troublesome and time consuming and the process also created misunderstanding between stakeholders and taxmen.
Now, there will remain no problems as SD rate has been made uniform for both the soft drinks and energy drinks, officials said.
Currently, Akij group, Partex, SST beverage, Transcom and Pran are producing energy drinks while MM Ispahani, Global Beverage Company Limited, Pran, Transcom, Partex, Akij Food and Beverage, and Tabani beverage have different brands of carbonated soft drinks.
-With New Age input
