LONDON: The Bureau of Customs failed to meet its collection target for November, largely on account of the holidays and traffic schemes in place during the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Summit.
The bureau registered total collections of P29.1 billion in November or 27.4-percent off the P40-billion target and 6.9-percent down from P31.2 billion a year earlier. The numbers for November 2015 reflect the P175 million transferred by the Bureau of the Treasury which consists of the trust fund payment of VAT cash refunds on various importations.
“The Customs Bureau also notes that despite expediting services several weeks before the APEC meetings, limited port activity had severely affected revenues,” the bureau said. “Truck bans, road closures and traffic rerouting schemes within the ports’ perimeters further pulled down the daily average collection from P2 billion to as low as P50 million,” it said.
The bureau also attributed the decline in collections to the decrease in the total value of imports which dropped by 7.2 percent, despite the increase in the total volume of importation which grew by 12.8 percent.
The volume of non-oil imports grew by 19.4 percent, but was offset by declines in production costs and lower import values caused by the drop in global oil prices. The volume of oil imports decreased by 10.2 percent and the value by 47.2 percent, lowering the total collections from oil shipments by 37.9 percent to P4.2 billion in November from P6.8 billion a year earlier.
