ISLAMABAD, Jan 7: The Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) has missed the Rs580 billion revenue collection target for the first half (July-Dec) of 2008-09 by Rs36.7 billion.

The finance ministry had raised the revenue target for the current fiscal year from Rs1,250 billion to Rs1,360 billion to meet one of the conditions set by the International Monetary Fund for its $7.6 billion loan.

A source in the ministry told Dawn that the FBR might also miss the annual revenue target because of economic slowdown, with large-scale manufacturing sector having recorded more than five per cent negative growth in the July-October period of 2008-09.

The negative growth was blamed on high cost of doing business and political instability, besides global recession.

The source said that decline in revenue collection was also because oil import bill had fallen with the huge decline in international crude prices.

During the last fiscal year, the government had received more than Rs154 billion from oil sector, about 23 per cent of the total indirect taxes.

Payments under the head of voluntary income tax have been declining for two years due to the suspension of audit.

According to provisional figures, the FBR managed to collect Rs203.6 billion against a target of Rs229 billion for the July-December period of 2008-09.

The corporate sector filed 11,000 tax returns by December 31, while 21,008 companies have been registered with the tax department. Last year, more than 13,000 corporate returns were filed.

An amount of Rs214.7 billion has been collected as general sales tax against a target of Rs226 billion for first half of the fiscal year.

The collection of federal excise duty was Rs52.2 billion against a target of Rs53 billion.

Customs duty collection was Rs72.8 billion against a target of Rs74 billion.