Gabon has just increased some “duties” in the 2020 budget bill. The increase in this indirect tax would, according to economic operators, lead to the inevitable increase in the prices of drinks imported into Gabon.
The increase in “excise duties” that the government has just operated in the 2020 supplementary finance bill validates this hypothesis. This new tax will lead, as an economic operator questioned on the situation suggests, an inevitable increase in the price of all imported drinks in the coming weeks.
“Take the case of a bottle of wine that a Gabonese importer bought in France for 500 CFA francs. After the calculation of transport, customs, excise duties and port taxes, this bottle arrived in its warehouse in Libreville in 2017 at a cost price of 950 CFA francs. In 2020, taking into account the first increase in 2018 and after application of the new excise duties, the same bottle would now cost 1,360 CFA francs, or 42% more expensive than 2 years earlier, “he said anonymously.
If he says he understands the approach of the government which seeks to bail out the coffers of the State, planed by the constraints of the Covid-19, this economic operator suggests to the State to learn “the lessons of the first increase in the rights of excise duties and the introduction of a specific tax per litre in 2018 ”. The increase, he noted, “had resulted in a drastic drop in wine and liquor sales from 25% to 45% in two years”. This situation, he continued, had led to “the lower contributions” of operators in the sector, in terms of customs and tax revenue.
The increase in these fees also risks penalizing the hotel sector. According to a hotel manager, “this tax will be a major blow to the hotel sector, especially the cafes and restaurants, weakened by the Covid-19 crisis. Because the sale of beers, wines and spirits represents more than 40% of their turnover and a large part of their operating margin, “he regretted.