Islamabad: To enhance business in the former Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA), the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) has granted a tax exemption to industries on a quota determined against installed capacity, news sources reported on April 3. The tax exemption will be given based on the quota for the import of raw materials.
Reportedly, FBR Chairman Dr Muhammad Ashfaq Ahmed has directed that exercise/survey to estimate the installed capacity required to be completed by April 15. It was also decided that after April 15, industrial units will be prohibited from exceeding their quotas based on installed capacity under the Sixth Schedule of the Sales Tax Act of 1990 and the Income Tax Ordinance of 2001.
The FATA and Provincially Administered Tribal Areas (PATA) were combined in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) in 2018 and are tax-free for the next five years until 2023. The deal protected the region’s industry from sales tax and import charges on raw materials coming to the Karachi port. However, the goods of all such enterprises were only allowed to be sold in the governed parts of the country, not in the tariff areas.
Following the new arrangement, the FBR identified 140 units of steel, oil and ghee, plastics, and textile in FATA/PATA, of which 58 units were handed to the FBR, with reports of 20 additional units in the pipeline for tax exemption.
Nauman Ahmad is an imaginative Pisces whose love for literature and nature is unparalleled. When he's not reading or hiking, he's sleeping and eating, which gives him plenty of energy for his next adventure.
