Vietnam's customs department contributed a record 348 trillion VND (15 billion USD) to the State budget from the collection of import and export taxes in 2019, according to the General Department of Customs.

Luu Manh Tuong, Director of the Import-Export Tax Department under the General Department of Customs, said the tax collected in 2019 was 34 trillion VND higher than in 2018.

Free trade agreements between Vietnam and its partners, including the Republic of Korea, ASEAN and the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP), had helped improve Vietnam’s business climate.

This result was also due to strong growth in trade that reached 510 billion USD last year, Tuong said.

Statistics showed that 105.16 billion USD of imports and exports were taxed, up 7.97 percent year-on-year. This figure included 5.8 billion USD from exports, down 1.8 percent, and 99.36 billion USD from imports, up 8.6 percent.

The largest impact on State tax collection was the Nghi Son Refinery and Petrochemical Plant.

The plant imported more than 7 million tonnes of crude oil worth 3.33 billion USD, up 58 percent in volume and 38 percent in value year on year. It paid 7.9 trillion VND (341.6 million USD) in import taxes, a year-on-year surge of 41 percent.

Imports of complete built-up (CBU) cars also contributed 2.91 billion USD in total, up 97.7 percent in value year on year.

The State collected total tax revenue of 38.2 trillion VND (1.6 billion USD) from the imports, up by 102.4 percent over the same period of 2018.

However, reduced import tariffs under FTA commitments had hit revenue collection.

The General Department of Customs forecasts this would continue to be a problem this year because more FTAs were coming into effect.