Striving to achieve highest results for the state budget estimate in 2021

According to General Department of Taxation, October's revenue increased compared to August and September

State budget revenue increases 5.5%

According to Minister of Finance Ho Duc Phoc, in the first 10 months of 2021, in the context of many difficulties and challenges in implementing budget management, the whole Finance sector strived to complete assigned tasks. Along with managing revenue collection closely following the schedule, the Finance sector has actively advised the Government and implemented fiscal policies to support economic recovery.

Data from the Ministry of Finance showed that the 10-month state revenue collection reached VND1,221 trillion, equaling 90.9% of current appropriation, increasing 5.5% over the same period in 2020.

Also according to the aggregated data of the State Treasury on Tabmis system, by the end of October 31, 2021, the 10-month state revenue equaled 91.1% of current appropriation. In particular, the central budget reached 87% of the current appropriation and the local budget reached 96.7% of the current appropriation.

Notably, after many localities have loosened social distancing from the end of September to the beginning of October, production and business activities began to return, which positively impacted October’s revenue collection. The result was better than the result in previous months.

Specifically, October's state budget revenue reached VND133.2 trillion. Accordingly, domestic revenue reached VND116.3 trillion, an increase of about VND59 trillion compared to September. Furthermore, October is the time when businesses declare and pay taxes following the regime that are allowed to be collected on a quarterly basis (such as CIT, PIT, VAT of enterprises that have turnover of less than VND20 billion arising in the third quarter of the year, it shall be paid in the beginning of the fourth quarter). At the same time, in October, VND16 trillion of VAT and CIT was collected for the state budget in accordance with Decree No. 52/2021/ND-CP dated April 19, 2021 of the Government.

According to Mr. Cao Anh Tuan, Director of the General Department of Taxation, due to the increase in oil prices, and many localities relaxing social distancing, the income from CIT and the extension to be paid by enterprises on October 31. Hence, October's revenue increased compared to August and September. In November and December, revenues will be reviewed.

The revenue of the localities is good but uneven, especially in the southern provinces and localities that have to apply social distancing measures, the revenue collection is low. There are 14 out of 63 localities that have reached less than 85% of the estimate. The General Department of Taxation recently also focused on supporting two key revenue collection localities, Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City. In the near future, the General Department of Taxation will continue to support other localities following the collection management scenario in order to achieve the amount of revenue that is being reported to the National Assembly and try to have more than 55 localities complete the estimate.

Efforts at the highest level to reach the finish line

In October, the net revenues from import and export reached VND12.95 trillion based on the total tax revenue of nearly VND28 trillion; value-added tax refund under the regime is VND15 trillion. Accumulated net revenues from import-export in 10 months of 2021 reached VND190.25 trillion, equaling 106.6 percent of the current appropriation, up 27.7% over the same period last year.

According to the Director of the General Department of Vietnam Customs Nguyen Van Can, after the southern provinces loosened social distancing, the total import-export turnover in October increased by approximately 2%, leading to an increase in the revenue from import-export activities of October compared to September, reaching VND28 trillion. From now until the end of 2021, the Customs sector will undertake many different solutions to achieve the highest results in revenue from import-export activities.

Regarding state budget expenditure, the Ministry of Finance said that in the past 10 months, the state budget has spent VND1,149.4 trillion, equaling 68.1% of current appropriation.

State budget expenditure in October alone reached VND107.3 trillion. In particular, expenditure on development investment reached VND257.39 trillion, equaling 53.9% of the current appropriation decided by the National Assembly, payment of debt reached VND85.37 trillion, equaling 77.6% of the current appropriation, and recurrent expenditures reached nearly VND798.1 trillion, equaling 77% of current appropriation.

Particularly for disbursement of development investment capital, in the past 10 months, development investment expenditure reached 55.8% of the plan assigned by the Prime Minister. Domestic capital reached 60.89%, foreign capital reached 15.29% of the plan assigned by the Prime Minister.

There are seven ministries and 20 localities that have a disbursement rate of over 65%; 32 out of 50 ministries and 21 out of 63 localities have disbursement rates below 50%. The Ministry of Finance said that because the spending schedule was lower than the budget collection schedule, the total state budget balance in 10 months witnessed a surplus, however, the central budget balance experienced a deficit, and the local budget witnessed a large surplus.

Directing the financial management of the budget from now until the end of the year, Minister Ho Duc Phoc suggested that affiliated units must regularly review and inspect work progress, be proactive, creative and put efforts at the highest level; successfully implementing the financial and budgetary tasks in 2021; completing the task of developing legal documents, reporting problems in the process of drafting legal documents. Along with that, promptly advising the Government on fiscal policy in developing economic management scenarios and fiscal solutions to support growth, businesses and people to overcome difficulties caused by the pandemic.

Some key contents also emphasized by the Minister are effectively managing ODA loans; issue government bonds to cover overspending; definitively settle the recording of grants.

Regarding solutions for revenue collection, Minister Ho Duc Phuoc proposed tax authorities strengthen the application of information technology in management and promote collection solutions on digital platforms, accelerate the deployment of e-invoices, build a data center of e-invoices and manage it using artificial intelligence.