Environment Surcharge
NBR, DoE differ over industry specification
The National Board of Revenue has failed to issue gazette notification containing the names of polluting industries imposing 1 per cent environment surcharge due to its difference of opinion over the definition of industry with the Department of Environment, officials said.
They said that the NBR would issue the gazette notification after getting the revised list of polluting industries.
They said that revenue board officials remained under pressure from the finance ministry for settling the issue within a shortest possible time.
On August 13, the DoE sent a list to the NBR for imposing environment surcharge containing the names of 2,498 factories which had been earlier penalised for violating the Environment Conservation Act-1995.
Now, the question arises whether some of sectors including brick kilns will be considered as industry or not as brick kiln is not declared as industry by the government.
According to the list, brick kilns sector is identified as the highest polluter with 924 brick fields that pollute environment in the country.
Environment and forest minister Anwar Hossain in March 7 this year, however, told parliament that some 4,400 brick kilns out of 6,417 operating across the country were not environment-friendly.
On the other hand, 200 hospital including government hospitals, clinics and diagnostic centres which are from services industry included in the list.
According to the Finance Act-2014, the government imposed 1 per cent surcharge on the prices of the products produced by the polluting industries that came into effect from July 2014.
But even after three months, the revenue board could not impose the surcharge firstly because of not getting the list and now due to difference of opinion over terms with the DoE.
NBR officials said that DoE officials remained in confusion to include the names of brick fields in the list as the sector is not generally declared as industry by the government though automated brick kilns are recognised as industry.
On the other hand, NBR officials are also in dilemma over including government hospitals in the list for collecting surcharge.
Environment department officials argued that they penalised the units or factories from industry, services and other sectors for polluting environment but in the finance act the surcharge was imposed on only polluting industries, they said.
In this context, officials of NBR and DoE are working together to settle the issue and to finalise the names of polluting industries for collecting environment surcharge, officials said.
The number of factories will be included or excluded in the list from time to time if any new factory is identified as polluting one or becomes compliant, they said.
According to the primary list, textile industry including printing and washing factories have come as the second largest polluting sector as there are 440 factories that have been identified as polluting ones.
Officials said that there were a total of 255 units of ship breaking, dockyard, steel mills and metal industries sectors which were responsible for polluting environment.
Among other sectors, 168 tannery, leather and related factories, 71 rice and jute mills, 57 paper and paper board mills, 32 pharmaceuticals, 25 cold storages, 41 food and agro-processed factories, 41 rubber and plastic factories, 18 chemical factories and 195 factories from other sectors are also responsible for pollution.
-With New Age input
