The Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) has provisionally collected Rs 538 billion in July-December (2008-2009) against Rs 430 billion in the corresponding period last fiscal, reflecting an increase of Rs 108 billion. Sources told Business Recorder on Thursday that the FBR is expecting an additional revenue of Rs 6-10 billion, which would take the overall collection to over Rs 548 billion.
In December 2008, the FBR has managed to collect an amount of Rs 110 billion. The revenue collection would further improve after compilation of final figures. Despite negative factors like economic slowdown, load shedding, less imports and sluggish business activity, tax machinery has surpassed Rs 538 billion during the first half of current fiscal.
Sources said that the FBR is satisfied with the current pace of revenue collection and it is expected that the board would achieve the over ambitious target of Rs 1.360 trillion by the end of current fiscal. Tax authorities have to meet the over ambitious revenue collection target of Rs 1.360 trillion against the budgetary target of Rs 1.250 trillion, projecting an increase of Rs 110 billion additional collections till June 30, 2008.
The board had collected Rs 1.02 trillion during July-June (2007-2008) against Rs 847.236 billion in the corresponding period of last fiscal year, reflecting an overall growth of 18.3 percent. At the start of current fiscal, the government had fixed Rs 1.250 trillion revenue target for financial year 2008-2009, which was Rs 35 billion higher as compared to the revised target of Rs 990 billion for 2007-2008. Later, the government considerably enhanced the target for 2008-2009 to generate maximum revenue.