EVEN with the unimpressive revenue collection for the first half of the current fiscal year, Lt. Gov. Diego T. Benavente is still optimistic that the government will meet its target collection of $193 million.
“We are still very hopeful. There are signs (of growth) and in my opinion, there are some developments in the economy— (they’re) very small, but they’re there,” said Benavente in an interview Friday.
The government only collected $92.38 million in revenue for the first and second quarters of 2002. This is 12 percent lower than the estimated earnings of $104.86 million for the period.
Though the lt. governor admitted that the collection for the first half of the fiscal year was way below the target, he said the third and fourth quarters may still bring earnings upward “if we will work hard together” in saving resources and improving collection effort.
Based on data sent by the Department of Finance to the House Committee on Ways and Means, of the 51 sources of government revenue, 39 recorded a decrease in collection compared to the target.
Income tax collection from four sources was only $45.8 million or 13.7 percent lower than the target of $53.091 million.
Excise tax collection from 16 various sources was $8.57 million or down by 13.1 percent compared to the target collection of $9.87 million.
Also, other taxes from bars, hotels and user fee dipped by 9.6 percent to $16.72 million from $18.49 million.
Beverage container tax collection went down by 2.4 percent to $664,363 from the target of $681,000.
Licenses and fees from seven other sources decreased by 13.4 percent to $1.008 million from $1.16 million.
The bulk of revenue usually comes from the first and second quarter collections of the fiscal year since this is the time when businessmen renew their licenses and pay their other obligations to the government.
Gov. Juan N. Babauta earlier said the government might incur a $24 million deficit for 2002 unless drastic measures were put in place.
He appealed to all department and agency heads to “pull our efforts together as managers” to prevent deficit spending.
