Government Collects ₱257.23 Billion in Taxes Through Fuel Marking

Around ₱257.23 billion taxes have been collected by the Bureau of Customs and Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) as of July 9 since the government first launched its fuel marking program in 2019.

Customs secured ₱227.75 billion accounting for 89% of the total. The remaining 11% or ₱29.48 billion was secured by the BIR. Just last week, Customs disclosed that it collected ₱74.72 billion in taxes during the first quarter of the year by validating the authenticity of 8.35 billion liters of diesel, gasoline, and kerosene.

According to Finance Secretary Carlos Dominguez III, the government has already marked 26.49 billion liters of fuel since the beginning of the program. Diesel accounts for the largest portion at 61% or roughly around 16.13 liters of total volume, gasoline followed at 10.21 billion liters, and then kerosene at 142.27 million liters.

Fuel marking requires regulators to determine if the taxes of respective petroleum products have already been paid. This is done through the use of a chemical identifier. Regulators can only ask an owner or distributor to pay its duties and penalties if a product contains less than 95% of the set marker level.

Furthermore, the program was implemented to combat the smuggling and misdeclaration of fuel products. Fuel marking falls under the Tax Reform for Acceleration and Inclusion Law, which was passed in 2017.

Through this fairly new regulation, the government also hopes to improve its tax collection from fuel importation and production.

Source: PhilStar