ISLAMABAD: The Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) missed its collection target by almost 9.82 per cent, or Rs61 billion, for May owing to a steep decline in imports as well as poor sales tax performance, showed provisional data.

The revenue collection stood at Rs560bn in May against the target of Rs621bn. This reversal of trend will make it a daunting task for the FBR field formations to make a huge recovery in June, the last month of FY23, to achieve the annual target.

However, May’s collection posted 13pc growth compared to last year’s Rs495bn. A few billions more may come to the government kitty when book adjustments are made in the next few days.

As a result of April’s dip, the shortfall widened to Rs442bn as total collection stood at Rs6.198 trillion in 11MFY23 against the target of Rs6.640tr. The tax authorities, however, recorded a 15.44pc growth over Rs5.369tr collected in July-May FY22.

The growth is much below what the government had committed to the International Monetary Fund to achieve the projected target of Rs7.47tr for FY23.

The tax collection at the import stage fell drastically in 11MFY23 compared with the projected target for the same period. The decline was mainly attributed to a fall in imports of high-duty items like automobiles, electronic appliances, ceramics and other non-essential products.

The focus of the government is only to allow the import of energy, food and pharmaceutical products in a bid to save foreign exchange of the country. This is clear from the fact that the customs collection in May stood at Rs75bn as against the projected target of Rs105bn, a shortfall of Rs30bn in customs collection.

Published in Dawn, June 2nd, 2023