Vietnam: Oil import tax raised as global prices fall

Hanoi, January 8 (VNA) - The Finance Ministry of Vietnam has issued a circular guiding the increase of preferential import duty on oil and petrol by 7 to 11 percent. Under the Circular 03/2015/TT-BTC, which took effect on January 7, 2015, the import duty will be raised to 35 percent on petrol, kerosene and mazut, and 30 percent on diesel. The adjustment was in line with the maximum preferential import duty speculated in the directive 17728/BTC-CST of the Ministry, under the World Trade Organisation’s commitments in 2015, among other regulations. According to the General Statistics Office, last year Vietnam experienced an annual increase of 3.2 percent in crude oil export value, totalling 6.86 billion USD, as well as a 13.9 percent increase in the import value of petrol, totalling 7.2 billion USD, as compared to 2013. Vietnam is a crude oil exporter, with 1.3 million tonnes of export volume in 2013. The global market oil price has recently sunk to below 50 USD for the first time since 2009.