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The Cabinet Committee on Public Purchase today approved a proposal for procuring some one lakh Electronic Fiscal Devices (EFDs) along with management systems for expediting the process for collection of VAT.
The purchase proposal of supply, installation and commissioning and operation of Electronic Fiscal Device Management Systems (EFDMS) along with Electronic Fiscal Device (EFD), Sales Data Controller (SDC) and managed services was approved at a meeting of the cabinet committee on public purchase.
Finance Minister AHM Mustafa Kamal chaired the meeting.
Briefing reporters after the meeting at the Cabinet Division, Kamal said the day’s meeting decided to procure some one lakh unit EFDs in phases along with 500 unit SDCs and full-fledged management system with an expenditure of Taka 315.88 crore from a Chinese company.
He said that in the first order, the government would procure some 10,000 EFDs from the Chinese Company named SZZT-KMMT-SYNESIS-EATL while each EFD will cost around Taka 32,000.
He informed that the NBR would need around two lakh EFDs in the next two years along with necessary manpower.
Terming VAT as the main area of realizing revenue, the finance minister said the NBR would initially set up these EFDs at the shops and business houses to realize VAT while the cost of the EFDs would be realized from the owners of the business establishments gradually.
Besides, he said that the businesses would maintain these EFDs.
He said no matter the EFDs would be collected from various sources from Asia or Europe, the central server would be maintained by the NBR and it would control the whole process.
Referring to the enactment of the new VAT law from this first of July, he said that the government would not fail as the VAT rates in Bangladesh are one of the lowest in the world while the government also accepted the demands of the businesses of applying flexible multiple VAT rates instead of single rate.
Noting that the government’s bid of moving forward would be affected unless there is increased revenue generation, the finance minister said if the new VAT law is implemented fully, then the people of the country including the new generation would be benefitted.
Pointing towards Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s vision of turning Bangladesh as a developed country by 2041, he said, “It’s a challenging job and it’s not easy and I seek cooperation of all in this regard,”
Answering to a question, he said that the government would remain fully secured while procuring these EFDs from the Chinese company.
The meeting also approved five other purchase proposals including two in the power sector.
(BSS)
