The Uganda Revenue Authority (URA) collected a total of sh1662.2b during the month of February 2022.
According to a report the ministry has released, the revenue collection target government had set for URA for February is sh1730.5b and this means the shortfall registered is sh68.3b.
Partly because of COVID-19 on Uganda’s economy, URA has been registering a revenue collection shortfall every month since the current financial year of 2021/2022 started in July 2021 just as the case had been in the previous financial year of 2020.
Government, however, realized a surplus on taxes from international trade as revenue realized of sh711b was higher than the target of sh684.79b which led to a surplus of sh26.2b.
Indirect domestic tax collections were affected by underperformance by excise duty and VAT.
The report indicates that Excise duty collections were affected by administrative challenges in effective implementation of the digital tracking system coupled with lower than anticipated consumption of items such as beer, spirits, wines and near beer beverages.
VAT collection underperformed partly due to difficulties in implementing the rollout of the Electronic Fiscal Receipting and Invoicing System (EFRIS).
It is, therefore, important to note that the sh22.4trillion revenue target government set for the 2021/2022 financial year will not be achieved and the government will be left with a big deficit.
In the last financial year, revenue shortfall was more than sh2trillion and government had to resort to borrowing from commercial banks to balance the national budget.
Source: News vision