Al Amin :
The revenue collection from travel tax sector has dropped by 68 per cent to Tk 335 crore in the immediate past fiscal year (2020-21) blaming the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic situation.
The National Board of Revenue (NBR) earned only Tk335 crore against the target of Tk 1050 crore during the time, according to provisional data of the Revenue Board.
The travel tax collection, mainly paid by international passengers, was Tk 824 crore in the fiscal year 2019-20 and Tk 1,104 crore in the fiscal year 2018-2019.
Badiul Alam, Commissioner of the Tax Zone-1 told The New Nation, “The decline in revenue collection from the sector due to the number of international travellers has declined significantly during the immediate past fiscal year compared to previous fiscal years.”
“Our main travel destinations like India, Thailand Singapore were shut down in most of the time. This was the main reason to decline the revenue collection from the sector,” he added.
The international passengers have to pay travel tax ranging between Tk 500 and Tk 800 in case of travelling by land and water routes respectively and Tk 800 to Tk 2,500 by air based on their destinations.
The earnings from the sector has been reduced due to the number of international passengers has been declined sharply as different countries imposed travel ban during the pandemic time, NBR officials said.
They said the number of the international passengers was over 17,000 a day in the fiscal year 2018-19 but it has been started reducing since the beginning of the pandemic.
The Association of Travel Agents of Bangladesh (ATAB) said 26.71 lakh air tickets were sold in the 2018 calendar year with monthly average sales of 2.23 lakh from Bangladesh against 25.22 lakh with monthly average sales of 2.10 lakh in 2017.
The ratio was continued till the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic in March of the last year.
Md Mazharul H Bhuiyan, Secretary General of the ATAB, told The New Nation, “The issuance of the travel visa has been almost suspended since the starting of the ongoing pandemic in March of the last year.”
“Issuance of some medical and employment visa was on but the number was very poor. As result, the entrepreneurs of the travel agents are being losers as well as the government is losing revenue from the sector,” he added.
Easing tax collection from the sector, the NBR introduced online travel tax payment system to improve the quality of the service and evade tax by passengers recently.
