FG Grows VAT by Over 29 Percent to N424.71 Billion in Q3 2020

Finally, Nigeria’s internally generated revenue has started picking following a series of efforts by the federal government to up revenue and gradually diversify the nation’s economy from the unpredictable oil market.

In the latest report released by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), Nigeria generated N424.71 billion from the Value Added Tax (VAT) in the third quarter of 2020.

This was far higher than the N327.20 billion recorded for the second quarter of 2019 and almost doubled the N275.12 billion posted for the third quarter of 2019.

On a quarterly basis, VAT rose by 29.8 percent and 54.37 percent year-on-year, according to the report.

A breakdown of the report showed the manufacturing sector contributed the most VAT during the period under review.

The report revealed that the sector contributed N47.07 billion to the total VAT generated for the third quarter.

“Other manufacturing generated the highest amount of VAT with N47.07bn generated,” the bureau said.

The professional services sector followed with N44.01 billion.

The non-import VAT locally stood at N214.66 billion for the period while non-import VAT foreign and Nigerian Customs Service-import VAT were, N115.34 billion and N94.70 billion, respectively.

The increase will delight the International Monetary Fund (IMF) that has been complaining about the low Nigeria’s revenue to GDP and the need to increase revenue collection efficiency.