No tax holiday for leather industry: Muhith

Special Correspondent: Finance Minister Abul Maal Abdul Muhith has ruled out a demand of tax holiday for 7 to 10 years to encourage investment in the leather industry city.

He said, “There is currently no scope for tax holiday.”

The Minister said this in a pre-budget discussion with Bangladesh Tanners Association (BTA) held at the conference room of the Finance Ministry at the Secretariat on Sunday.

A delegation led by BTA president Shahin Ahmed met the Finance Minister and placed a six-point demand to him to include it in the upcoming budget of 2018-2019 fiscal year.

BTA president Shahin Ahmed said the leather is an emerging export-oriented labor-intensive sector in the national economy. Now, it has promoted to the second highest sector in export business. Tannery industries have been shifted to Savar from Hazaribagh of the capital establish eco-friendly leather industrial estate.

He said the export target in leather sector has been set 5 billion US dollars by 2021. SDG (Sustainable Development Goals) targets will have to be achieved by 2030. Leather industry is committed to play a helpful role to achieve the target.

We placed our written statement to the Finance Minister. We expect that our demands will be met in the next budget considering interests for one of the most important industries of the country.

Besides the tax holiday for 7 to 10 years, the organisation also demanded 50 percent tax cut on chemical substances which are essential for leather industry.

 

risingbd/Dhaka/May 20, 2018/Hasnat/A K Azad