Over 135 billion afs revenue collected in past year: MoF

KABUL (Pajhwok): The Ministry of Finance (MoF) has collected more than 135 billion afghanis revenue during the past one year and allocated four billion afghanis for pension to retired service members.

Addressing reporters here, Finance Minister Mullah HidaytullahBadri said the MoF collected over 70 billion afs in customs revenue while over 65 billion afs were collected in income-tax and non-income tax revenue in the past year.

In order to encourage tax payment, the ministry reduced income tax rate from 1.5 to 0.5 and waived off fines of past years, he added.

He said for the first time the national budget was prepared from local revenues and projects that were vital for economic survival were included in the budget.

He said the Qush Tepa canal project in northern Jawzjan province, which was vital for the country, had been included in the budget and up to seven billion afs allocated for the project this year.

Badri said holding the international conference on Afghanistan's economy, normalizing economic interactions with the international community, reducing sanctions on Afghanistan's banking sector, attracting humanitarian aid and earning the commitment of the United Nations and the international community for durability of short-term and long-term aid were among other achievements of the Ministry of Finance during the past year.

He said in order to attract cadres and professional individuals for the best positions, hundreds of professional individuals had been appointed in the ministry through fair competitions and 1,058 more new positions would be announced as well.

Badri said revamping and standardizing work of eight state-run companies had been resumed as well as reactivation of other national companies such as Balkh Selo, Pul-i-Khumri Selo, Afghan Garment Factory, Kandahar Garment Factory, Baghlan Sugar Mill and handicraft products companies.

Referring to the pension of retired personnel, Finance Ministry Spokesperson Ahmad WaliHaqmal said the issue would be resolved soon.

He said: “The issue of pensions is almost resolved, we have allocated four billion afghanis in the budget for pensions, there were some technical problems but the Ministry of Finance and the Academy of Sciences resolved those problems, a plan is prepared in this regard and we presented it to the cabinet yesterday. We hope it will be accepted.”

nh/ma