Based on the results of Plan 30 on administrative procedure reform, Vietnam’s Finance Ministry has issued 3 decisions on managing administrative procedures, fully reporting tasks of managing administrative procedures and organising supervision in organs like Vietnam Customs, General Department of Taxes, State Securities Commission of Vietnam, and the State Treasury. The tax authorities have been implementing the strategy of modernising the tax sector step by step, promoting partnership with foreign countries to build up a modern and sustainable tax sector.
The tax sector has piloted the programme of “self – tax payment” where tax payers declare, pay taxes and are responsible for themselves. This is a big change in the tax sector recently. Moreover, the “one door” mechanism is highly appreciated by enterprises. Tax authorities also aggressively establish tax agencies to provide services to help tax payers declare and fulfil their responsibilities on the internet (some 274,000 enterprises have participated and piloted paying taxes online), as well as advising and responding to enterprises' questions by email. Especially, tax authorities also organise meetings with enterprises to resolve their troubles, enhance supervision and inspection of tax paying and receiving. By now, the authorities have issued nearly 20 million individual tax codes. Besides, tax authorities have applied information technology, and actively plan to supervise and inspect the implementation of administrative procedure reform in responsible sectors.
In addition, the tax sector has pushed cooperation and partnership with foreign countries to exchange experiences and support import – export enterprises. Applying taxes also helps increase foreign investment in the future; so far there have been 15,100 FDI projects in Vietnam with total registered capital of US$220 billion, nearly 50 percent of which has been disbursed (US$107 billion). This success is attributed largely to preferential tax regulations. Thanks to these favourable taxes, Vietnam has become an attractive place for investment. In the context of crisis since 2008, Vietnam has still maintained its attraction to investors. For the past years, Japan, the Republic of Korea and Singapore are among the largest investors in Vietnam. New preferential tax policies approved by the National Assembly in the amended Law on Taxes (that will take effect from 1st January 2014), like:
- Reduce tax rates for enterprises to 22 percent from 1st January 2014 and to 20 percent from 1st January 2016. Enterprises with total revenues of under VND20 billion will be under the tax rates of 20 percent from 1st July 2013.
- Expand preferential tax objects and adjust levels of exempting, reducing taxes, especially in the field of agriculture – farmers – rural areas, the non-profit sector, socialized field, poverty – stricken areas and fields that need investment, and industrial zones; and supplement preferential conditions for expanded investment.
- Adjust preferential objects based on investment projects to be suitable with actual conditions and the Law on Investment.
The Government has also approved a strategy of reforming the tax system in the period of 2011 – 2020 with the aim of simplifying administrative tax procedures, creating favourable conditions for taxpayers, standardizing the tax management process by comprehensively applying information technology, preventing transfer pricing and tax fraud, and encouraging tax responsibilities fulfilment through tax agencies.
Thanh Nga
Vietnamese
