NEWS - Myanmar Collects 150 Million

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Subject: NEWS - Myanmar Collects 150 Million U.S. Dollars in (REPORTED) Taxes

Myanmar Collects 150 Million U.S. Dollars in (REPORTED) Taxes
RP:NOTE- This doesn't include the taxes demanded from Burmese expatriots
by the embassies. There are other unmentioned extortions by the
embassies as well.  Also, this does not include the Millions of Kyats
extorted from villages and farmers by the military.
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YANGON (Sept. 16) XINHUA - Myanmar's State Internal Revenue Department
collected a total of 155.7 million U.S. dollars of taxes in fiscal
1998-99 which ended in March, a 21.83-percent increase over the previous
fiscal year when the 127.8 million dollars was collected. 

Of the total, commodities and services tax and commercial tax accounted
for 46.97 percent while income tax represented 34.26 percent and profit
tax 8 percent, the latest government statistics show. 

To reduce the impact of the Asian financial crisis, the Myanmar
government adopted some new policies to collect taxes in the country in
recent years. 

Exemption of customs duties on the import of agricultural implements,
including related machinery, pesticide and fertilizer, was among the
measures taken to ensure that agriculture, the mainstay of the country's
economy, is not effected. 

Other measures cover raising the customs duties of luxury goods imported
and levying an 8-percent commercial tax on foreign currencies beginning
January 1, 1999.