Something is not quite right with the budget revenue in Bulgaria. Especially when it comes to the Customs Offices. The state has taken to strengthen them so that they may strengthen the state.
Customs Agency will swallow almost 20 million levs in order to improve its performance.
The additional cost of strengthening the customs is another 35 million at the expense of the central budget, which must be approved by the Council of Ministers. This provides a draft decree of the Cabinet, which was released for public consultation on the website of the Ministry of Finance. Apart from the sum for the customs, an additional amount of money will go for the credit rating of the country (2.2 million levs), as well as for the development and maintenance of information systems and infrastructures (12.35 million levs), for the payment of housing vouchers to citizens (500,000 levs), plus other activities related to the increase in the collection of public revenue and investment projects in the NRA and Customs Agency.
The BANKER took interest on what the said twenty million would be spent. The answer was: mainly to complete the repair of checkpoint Captain Andreevo. Furthermore, some funds will be given to buying new and repair of old scanners, as well as road widenings to stop potential offenders on the road from the fiscal control body and other supervising authorities. The question of the BANKER as to why is it necessary for the country to allocate new funding for the border with Turkey, the Ministry of Finance replied that the project approved by the World Bank and co-financed by it had some gaps. Such an omission was the lack of… barriers. Until recently, this fact did not strike anyone, but now, when the lack of such mechanism became obvious, it turned out that the project with the World Bank did not provide and money to build them.
„How can we join Schengen Zone when the external borders of the European Union show no basic security. A border without barriers is a novelty in the world practice,“ commented a representative of the Finance Ministry.
Money goes completely justifiably for scanners which were already in shortage, so that all risk imports from Bulgaria’s internal borders with the EU – those with Romania and Greece may be covered, as well as to look for smuggled goods. The technical equipment that „remember“ the density of legally transported goods and react only if the inside of a lorry there are goods with different densities needed urgent repairs. Much of the scanners now are at the borders just to scare the smugglers. If any of them, however, had insider information that the devices did not work well, then underground activities may remain completely undetected.
Three mobile X-ray scanners will be purchased and together with them Bulgaria’s borders will be equipped with 16, commented briefly representatives of the customs management.
In order to grant such additional amount, the Government is apparently highly concerned about the activities of customs offices, commented representatives of the Ministry of Finance. The failure to comply with the planned figures for the revenues in 2013, as compared to the revised budget plan for that year, is about 323 million levs. This wass indicated in an analysis of revenue collection rate in 2013 by the Customs Agency, released a few days ago.
The planed revenue of the Customs Agency in 2013 was 8.5 billion levs, and after the update – respectively 8.35 billion levs. Revenue collected by the Agency, however, amounted to 8.02 billion levs. The failure widens to 59.2 million levs, while the VAT gap is 289.7 million levs. Revenues from customs duties have been exceeded by 26.2 million levs. The analysis shows that in the second half of 2013 the revenue showed a registered growth of 16.93% compared to the first six months of the same year (i.e. 626.2 million levs more).
Failure to meet the plan experiences by the customs was the highest in the last two months of last year and the first two of 2014, that is once the big reshuffles at the top of the department began. Apparently political appointees have put a rod in the wheel of socialist party’s election promises to collect over a billion more through measures against smuggling and VAT fraud. The plan for the customs for last year was so prepared that expectations were the collection rate to be the highest in autumn. This may be due to seasonal factors – for example, in this period, revenues from import VAT and excise duties increase. Another explanation is purely political – as it was known that an election was coming mid-year.
Astonishment however was raised by the revision of the plan for VAT on imports, collected by the agency. After the update of the budget it was increased by 25 million levs, although still at the debates in Parliament last year, the government pointed out as an argument for the restructuring of the financial plan of the state the reduction of fuel prices on international markets and the depreciation of the U.S. dollar. In the end it turned out that customs have collected almost 290 million levs less worth of VAT compared to the planned amount last year.
In purely political terms, one of the main promises of the socialist party, which was set out in the Budget 2014 was to increase the budget revenue by over 1 billion levs. This is achievable by combating smuggling and the gray economy, and by optimizing the performance of revenue agencies (the NRA and the Customs Agency) said at the end of last year the socialist MP and chairwoman the social affairs committee in Parliament Cornelia Ninova. However, the nig promises may turn out to be the Achilles heel of the ruling majority and a subject of a massive attack by the opposition in case of possible early parliamentary elections.
The BANKER
