Customs Revenues Rise by 17.8% by late January

Rabat – Statistics released by the General Treasury have shown that tax revenue reached MAD 17.3 billion at the end of January 2017, compared with MAD 16.4 billion in the same period last year, marking an increase of 5.5%.

This growth is mainly due to the increase in customs revenues, which amounted to MAD 4.7 billion, marking an increase of 17.8% in the first month of the current year.

Value Added Tax (VAT) revenues registered significant growth. The General Treasury report shows that revenue from import VAT jumped by 14% to MAD 2.7 billion at the end of January, while VAT on energy products grew by 53.6% for the same period, registering an additional MAD 173 million.

Domestic VAT receipts increased by 14.3% to MAD +343 million, compared to late January 2016 when it had decreased by 11.1%. These receipts take into account reimbursements for an amount of MAD 228 million at the end of January 2017, compared with MAD 453 million at the end of January 2016.

The report also notes that non-tax revenues have increased by 107.8% from MAD 319 million to MAD 663 million. This growth, according to the Treasury General of the Kingdom, is driven by the increase in monopoly revenues reaching at the end of January MAD 236 million, compared to MAD 39 million in 2016.

This growth is also explained by the payment for the special accounts of the Treasury of MAD 175 million to the general budget, combined with the decrease of the expenditure of the debt passing from MAD 79 million to 6 million. According to the report, spending under the general budget also increased by 2.7%, reaching approximately MAD 27.9 billion at the end of January.

As for capital expenditure, the Treasury’s report shows that the general budget amounted to MAD 11.3 billion at the end of January 2017, compared to MAD 11.4 billion a year earlier, marking a decrease of 0.9% due to the fall in common expenses of 10, 1%, and an increase in departmental spending by 86.4%.