São Paulo – The United Arab Emirates tax revenue, including value-added tax (VAT), amounted to 5.5% of the total public revenue last year, according to the Ministry of Finance, as reported by Emirate News Agency (WAM).
The UAE total overall revenues in the government budget amounted to AED 456 billion (USD 124.16 billion) in 2018, including tax revenues worth AED 25 billion (USD 6.8 billion). Oil revenues and the profits of public joint-stock companies accounted for 36.1% and 32.9%, respectively, the ministry reported.
The UAE’s decision to apply VAT in January 2018 has benefited the country, which witnessed a budget surplus of 2.2% compared to deficits of 0.2%, 1.3% and 6.4% in 2017, 2016 and 2015, respectively. The ministry pointed out that the budget surplus in 2018 resulted from the growth of general revenue by 13.3%, which surpassed the rate of public spending growth of 4.2%.
VAT has a rate of 5% on goods and services and aims at promoting economic growth in isolation from oil revenues. The budged deficits that the Gulf countries have seen over the last years reflect the price decline of the commodity in the global market.
Translated by Guilherme Miranda