ISLAMABAD: The Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) has claimed that revenue collection from sugar sector has soared 11 percent to Rs32.43 billion during ongoing fiscal year 2021-22 so far, as compared to Rs29.30 billion collected in same period of last fiscal year.
According to FBR, significant growth in revenue collection from the sugar sector shows that implementation of Track & Trace System (TTS) and digital monitoring is resulting positively.
The installation of Track & Trace System was undertaken in October and November 2021 and all the sugar mills were delivered applicators along with tax stamps to be affixed on each sugar bag.
The FBR vide STGO # 5 of 2021 had notified that no sugar bag would be allowed to be taken out from a production site or a manufacturing facility without affixation of tax stamps and unique identification marking (UIMs). However, TTS was formally inaugurated by Prime Minister Imran Khan on 23rd November, 2021.
In order to ensure enforcement of movement of sugar bags with tax stamps, Inland Revenue Enforcement Network (IREN) was entrusted with the task to combat tax evasion in the Sugar Sector.
Regional Enforcement hubs all across Pakistan were tasked to conduct raids on the un-stamped / non-tax paid sugar. As a result, all IREN hubs intensified their operations against supply chain operators to ensure the implementation of TTS in letter and spirit.
In this regard, the Directorate of I&I (IR), Hyderabad visited various sugar dealers in Hyderabad on 27th November, 2021 and found a stock of 172 sugar bags manufactured by M/s Chamber Sugar Mills lying in the premises of M/s Gulzar & Co without Tax Stamps.
The same unstamped bags were taken into custody by the IREN team which created deterrence in the market. Since then more than 65 raids have been conducted by Regional IREN Hubs of Rawalpindi, Lahore, Faisalabad, Multan, Karachi, Hyderabad, Sukkur, Quetta and Peshawar in various cities and towns across the country but no sugar bags were found without tax stamps.
Advisor to PM on Finance and Revenue Shaukat Tarin has commended FBR for successful implementation of this innovative digital intervention, resulting in sizeable increase in tax revenue.
Likewise, Chairman FBR Dr Muhammad Ashfaq Ahmed has appreciated the outstanding performance of IREN squads in ensuring the desired compliance by the sugar sector which has started paying dividends.
He further said that TTS is one of the key interventions introduced by FBR to push its ongoing drive for digitization to achieve transparency and thereby maximize tax compliance.
