A. Lukashenko signed the law on the republican budget for 2011
18/10/20100 views
On October 18, Minsk /BELTA correspondent/. President of Belarus Alexander Lukashenko signed the laws "On the Republican Budget for 2011", "On Amendments and Additions to the Budget Code of the Republic of Belarus", "On Amendments and Additions to the Tax Code of the Republic of Belarus" and "On the Budget of the State Non-Budgetary Social Protection Fund of the Population of the Ministry of Labour and Social Protection of the Republic of Belarus for 2011" on October 15. This was reported to BELTA correspondent by the press service of the Belarusian leader.
The mentioned documents were adopted on September 14, 2010 by the House of Representatives (with the exception of the law "On the Budget of the State Non-Budgetary Social Protection Fund of the Population of the Ministry of Labour and Social Protection of the Population of the Republic of Belarus for 2011", which was adopted on September 7, 2010) and approved on October 4, 2010 by the Council of the Republic of the National Assembly of Belarus.
These laws provide for a number of measures for 2011 aimed at further improving the tax policy in the Republic of Belarus and maintaining the social orientation of state expenditures.
In particular, with the aim of further simplifying the tax system, the Law of the Republic of Belarus "On Amendments and Additions to the Tax Code of the Republic of Belarus" provides for the following from January 1, 2011.
1. To abolish:
a local tax on services, levied at a rate of 5% of revenue;
a local fee for the development of territories, payable at a rate of up to 3% of profit;
certain environmental tax payments:
for the processing of oil and petroleum products by organisations engaged in oil processing;
for the transit of oil and petroleum products through the territory of the Republic of Belarus by main oil pipelines and oil product pipelines;
for the production and (or) import of goods containing 50% or more volatile organic compounds.
According to government estimates, the implementation of these measures will reduce the tax burden in 2011 by 0.4% of GDP and leave Br721.2 billion at the disposal of taxpayers.
2. To exclude two separate tax payments by including them in:
the environmental tax - a fee for the import of ozone-depleting substances into the territory of the Republic of Belarus;
state duty - a fee for issuing permits for the passage of motor vehicles through the territories of foreign states.
3. To reduce the number of tax transfers to the budget:
on profit tax - to switch to quarterly tax payments with annual tax return submission (currently, in 70% of cases, these operations are performed monthly);
on VAT - to abolish "advance" payments (six payments per month) and to make payments of this tax once a month or once a quarter, at the taxpayer's discretion. In this case, the VAT payment deadlines (monthly or quarterly) will be determined by the taxpayer independently, without being tied to revenue size, as is currently the case. As a result, the number of payments will be reduced from 72 to 4-12 per year;
on excise taxes - to abolish "advance" payments (six payments per month) and to make payments of this tax once a month.
4. To improve the mechanism for collecting major taxes - profit tax and VAT, by:
expanding the possibility of applying a tax relief for profit allocated to capital investments. Profit will be exempted from taxation upon the completion of investments, without being linked to the use of the depreciation fund, as is currently the case. At the same time, to prevent significant budget losses due to the abolition of the limitation of the tax relief amount by the sum of the depreciation fund used for capital investments, it is proposed to limit the application of profit tax relief to 50% of gross profit;
granting taxpayers the right to deduct without limitation the "input" VAT paid when acquiring investment goods, which will contribute to reducing the cost of investment projects and attracting more investment. It is also proposed to grant taxpayers the right, when making investment expenditures, to deduct in equal installments throughout the calendar year (in the amount of 1/12 or 1/4) the amount of "input" VAT remaining after deducting VAT amounts within the limits of taxes calculated on the sale of goods (works, services), property rights.
The implementation of these measures will bring the tax system of the Republic of Belarus closer to the tax systems of developed countries in terms of the composition of taxes and fees, and the periodicity of their payment.
Taxpayers, in carrying out their ordinary activities, will pay only 8 major taxes (profit tax, excise taxes, VAT, environmental tax, land tax, property tax, social security contributions), make 20 tax payments to the budget during the year, and submit 11 tax returns (currently - 104 tax payments and 30 tax returns).
With contributions to the Social Protection Fund of the Ministry of Labour and Social Protection taken into account, the number of tax payments will amount to 32 per year, and the number of declarations to 15.
It should be noted that the reforms carried out in 2010 and 2011 will allow the Republic of Belarus to improve its ranking in the "Doing Business 2013" survey in the "Taxation" indicator to 70th place from 183rd place in 2009.
The introduction of additions and amendments to the Budget Code of the Republic of Belarus is aimed at unifying the norms of budget and tax legislation, bringing its individual provisions and terms (names of revenues and types of expenditures) into compliance with the normative legal acts of the President of the Republic of Belarus.
The Law of the Republic of Belarus "On the Republican Budget for 2011" provides that the revenues of the republican budget in 2011 will amount to Br33.61 trillion, and expenditures to Br39.61 trillion. The deficit of the republican budget is projected at Br6 trillion (or 3% of GDP), which corresponds to national and international financial security standards.
The main objectives of the budget policy for 2011 are defined as maintaining the achieved qualitative level of social services, supporting the real sector of the economy, implementing the housing construction program and other socially significant programs.
In 2011, compared to 2010, expenditures in the basic sectors of the social sphere (healthcare, education, social policy, physical culture and sports, culture and mass media) are planned to increase by 40%.
The Law of the Republic of Belarus "On the Budget of the State Non-Budgetary Social Protection Fund of the Ministry of Labour and Social Protection of the Republic of Belarus for 2011" approves expenditures of the said Fund for 2011 in the amount of Br20.49 trillion, taking into account projected revenues of Br20.69 trillion, which are 15% higher than planned for 2010, respectively. The excess of revenues over expenditures will amount to Br197 billion, which is 26% more than provided for 2010.
The main source of the Fund's revenues is state social insurance contributions of Br20.21 trillion (97.7% of the Fund's revenues).
The main areas of the Fund's expenditure will be:
- pension provision - Br16.45 trillion (80.3% of the Fund's expenditures);
- payment of benefits to families raising children - Br1.56 trillion (7.6%);
- payment of benefits for temporary disability - Br1.35 trillion (6.6%), for pregnancy and childbirth - Br367.8 billion (1.8%).
BELTA