Minister confirms restructuring SRO regimes

Urges focus from revenue generation to growth.

KARACHI:

Commerce Minister Khurram Dastgir Khan has said that the government is working on a plan to completely restructure Statutory Regulatory Order (SRO) regimes and the sale tax system to ease the problems of businessmen on sales tax refunds and minimise corruption in the system.

He was speaking to industrialists at the All Pakistan Textile Mills Association (APTMA) house on Wednesday.

“You will see a revolutionary progress in the upcoming budget as we are working on the restructuring of SROs,” he told participants, adding that the problems of refunds should also be resolved in this finance bill or in the finance bill of 2015. Our target should be growth and not just revenue generation, he added.

On demands of the release of refunds from participants, Dastgir repeatedly said that his ministry wants to release all sales tax refunds but it is taking time due to the limitations of the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR).

“Learning from the mistakes of the previous governments, we are not in favour of giving subsidies or rebates to different sectors because most of the time subsidies promote corruption,” he stressed.



This government desires to support industries but only on sustainable basis and not through artificial means. Our target is to double exports when we leave our office, he said.

Regarding Pakistan’s textile export prospects in Japan, the minister informed that he will soon invite Japanese commerce minister or visit Japan to discuss the prospects of free trade agreement (FTA) with the country.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 1^st, 2014.

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