ISLAMABAD - The Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) is struggling to achieve the revised tax collection target during outgoing fiscal year despite it would generate additional revenue due to enforcement of new taxation measures of next year before June.

The FBR during the first 11 months (July to May) of the current financial year has recorded a provisional net revenue collection of over Rs3274 billion as against Rs2854 billion collected during the same period of the previous fiscal year, excluding collection on account of book adjustments which depicts an increase of around 15 percent. The provisional collection for the month of May 2018 is Rs351 billion excluding collection on account of book adjustments.

The figures of collection received in the treasuries of the remote areas may further swell the revenue.

On 31st May, the FBR has issued further refunds of Rs31.3 billion to take the total amount of refunds issued during the year to more than Rs100 billion in first 11 months as against Rs54 billion issued during the entire 12 months of the previous year.

The FBR would have to collect Rs661 billion only in one month to achieve the revised target during outgoing fiscal year.

The federal government had already revised the tax collection target of FBR to Rs3935 billion for the outgoing fiscal year from the Rs4013. However, the FBR believes that it would achieve the revised target. "The revenue collection trend during the first eleven months of the financial year augurs well for the efforts of FBR towards achievement of the assigned revised annual revenue target," the FBR stated in a statement.

Meanwhile, the government is expecting to generate additional revenue of around Rs25 billion during outgoing fiscal year due to the enforcement of new rates of federal excise duty and customs duty from the last week of the current month. The increase in customs duties and federal excise duties rates has been enforced from the next day (May 23) of Acting President Sadiq Sanjrani's consent to the Finance Bill 2018.

Two excise duty measures have also been effective. Firstly, increase in the FED on cigarette has been enforced, while the FBR has also increased federal excise duty on cement from Rs1.25 per kg to Rs1.50 per kg. The expected additional revenue would increase the overall tax collection of the FBR during outgoing fiscal year. The federal government had already slashed the provinces share under NFC Award by Rs68.2 billion during ongoing fiscal year due to Federal Board of Revenue (FBR)'s inability to meet tax collection target.

The federal government would transfer Rs2.31 trillion to the four provinces under NFC Award during FY2018 as against the budgeted amount of Rs2.384 trillion. The share of Punjab provinces has reduced to Rs1138.4 billion from Rs1161.8 billion registering decline of Rs23.4 billion. The Sindh province share has also decreased to Rs584.3 billion from Rs612.6 billion showing reduction of Rs28.3 billion.

Meanwhile, the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province's share has reduced by Rs8.85 billion to Rs381 billion from budget estimates of Rs389.9 billion. The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa got one per cent additional due to the war on terror.

The federal government would transfer Rs212.32 billion to Balochistan during the fiscal year as compared to initial budget projection of Rs220 billion.