The Vietnamese government has recently decided to raise petroleum import tax to 5 per cent from current zero percent in a bid to compensate for the State budget in the wake of the global oil price fall closely to US$100 per barrel, Deputy Minister of Finance Do Hoang Anh Tuan said.
To be effective from Sept 15, the tariff hike will be applied to almost petroleum products including engine gasoline, airline gasoline, solvent, naptha, reformatic as well as other petroleum produce that are used to make up gasoline, lube, and oil finished products, Mr. Tuan said.
Vietnamese State budget has incurred a revenue reduction of VND25 trillion (US$1.51 billion) since May of 2007 when the government decided to cut the petrol import tax from 5 per cent to zero percent in line with consecutive soaring oil price in the world market.
Sept 11 in Singapore market where mainly supplies petroleum products for Vietnam, gasoline A92 price fell nearly US$6 per barrel to only US$105 per barrel, and finished diesel oil was offered at US$118 per barrel, the VnExpress daily reported.
With that price tumble, petroleum retail price to end-consumers may be slashed to VND14,000 (US$0.84) per liter, including transport, port, depreciation and newly-applied import tax, analysts said.
Vietnamese petroleum traders are making an estimated profit of nearly VND3,000 per liter of gasoline and VND2,500 per liter of oil, market watchdogs said.
Vietnamese relevant authorities, however, have not yet made any decision to cut local retail petrol prices for presence.
Vietnam now has to import almost petroleum products due to the lack of major oil refineries.
The country spent US$9.11 billion importing 9.61 million metric tons of petroleum products in the first eight months this year, up 94.3 per cent on year and 13.7 per cent, respectively, said the General Statistic Office (GSO). (VnExpress, News)
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