Nghe An Tax Department seeks ways to overcome difficulties to increase revenue from the mineral sector

Nghe An Tax Department said: According to statistics, the Tax Department is managing 215 enterprises with 254 mining licenses licensed by the Provincial People's Committee and the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment. Specifically, in 2021, the total revenue related to the mineral sector reached 904.2 billion VND, an increase of 109% over the same period in 2020, including: Resource tax: 524 billion 415 million VND; Environmental protection fee: 113 billion 949 million VND; Mineral exploitation right granting fee 265 billion 898 million VND. In the first 6 months of the year, according to incomplete statistics, the tax revenue from mineral exploitation right granting is estimated at 224 billion VND.

Chairman of the Provincial People's Committee Nguyen Duc Trung inspected the subsidence situation in Quy Hop. Photo: Thanh Duy

However, according to the Tax sector, there are still many difficulties and problems in this field. Specifically: Regarding the declaration and payment of Natural Resources Tax: Article 3 of Circular No. 152/2015/TT-BTC dated October 2, 2015 stipulates: “For mineral resource exploitation activities, taxpayers are organizations and business households licensed by competent state agencies.Mineral exploitation license.In case an organization is granted a Mineral Exploitation License by a competent state agency, is allowed to cooperate with organizations and individuals to exploit resources and has separate regulations on taxpayers, the taxpayer of natural resources is determined according to that document.".

In fact, there are many cases where minerals are exploited and traded without a license. Accordingly, the Tax Department has encountered difficulties in declaring and paying Natural Resources Tax for these cases.

The second difficulty is that mining sites are often located in remote areas, leading to difficulties in managing and monitoring the actual mineral output of enterprises.

Regarding sand mining activities: The situation of illegal sand mining and gathering and trading on rivers is complicated, operating day and night, causing difficulties in management.

The loss of resource tax revenue still exists, mainly because enterprises under-declared the actual exploited resource output, but the tax authority does not have enough authority and technical conditions to accurately determine the actual exploited resource output.

In addition, most mining enterprises do not fully install weighing stations at the locations where raw minerals are taken out of the mining area; install surveillance cameras at warehouses to store information and related documents as prescribed.

Currently, there are many enterprises that have a Decision to grant a mineral exploitation license but do not have a Decision to lease land, or the enterprise has a Decision to lease land, the Tax authority has established a set of fees to grant mineral exploitation rights or established a set of fees to collect land lease but in reality the enterprise has not been allocated land or has not been exploited for objective reasons. This leads to the enterprise also not being able to fulfill its obligations to the state budget.

Faced with the potential loss of mineral exploitation tax, Nghe An Tax Department has actively advised local authorities on management solutions; Fully implemented management work according to functions such as: propaganda, policy support for enterprises; Guiding and urging enterprises to self-declare according to regulations; handling tax debt collection; classifying tax risks to conduct tax inspections...

Mr. Trinh Thanh Hai - Director of Nghe An Tax Department also said: Currently, it is very difficult for the Tax Department to monitor the declared output compared to the actual exploitation volume of enterprises because self-declaration and self-payment is the right of enterprises and enterprises must be responsible before the law according to the Law on Tax Administration, and later on, after post-audit, enterprises will be responsible if the declaration is incorrect or incomplete. And the inspection of actual output of the Tax sector also requires the coordination of related sectors.

Every year, the Tax Department advises the Provincial People's Committee to issue a Directive on increasing state budget revenue, which stipulates the responsibilities of the Department of Natural Resources and Environment in coordinating with the Tax Department to carry out management of the mineral exploitation sector in the area.

Sand mining causes landslides in Song Con - Tan Ky. Photo: PV

The Tax Department sends the Department of Natural Resources and Environment data comparing the declared tax mineral output with the actual exploited mineral output in accordance with the provisions of Decree No. 158/2016/ND-CP dated November 29, 2016 of the Government.

The Tax Department also coordinated with the Department of Natural Resources and Environment and the Department of Finance to review the price for calculating the Natural Resources tax to advise the People's Committee to submit to the Ministry of Finance for amendments and supplements to suit the reality; the Tax Department advised the Provincial People's Committee to issue Decision 234 dated January 21, 2020 promulgating the Regulations on coordination in the collection and payment of the State budget in Nghe An province. In addition, participating in the interdisciplinary delegation established by the Provincial People's Committee to inspect and examine mineral exploitation enterprises in the area./.