Maldives Inland Revenue Authority (MIRA) has published its monthly revenue collection for January 2021. Citing the economic impact of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic as the reason for the 1.2% decrease compared to the same period last year, the Authority generated MVR 1.79 billion in revenue in the month of January 2021. Nevertheless. they note that this a 76.8% increase compared to what was projected.
The detailed report indicates that the biggest source of income for MIRA during this period was by income tax that totals up to MVR 777.6 million, corresponding to 43% of the revenue collected. This is followed by GST making up for 41% which is equivalent to MVR 734.6 million. From this, 28.7% is from the tourism sector whilst the remaining is from the general sector.
Additionally, MVR 52.34 was collected as Tourism Land Rent that is equivalent to 2.9% and MVR 45.57 million was collected as Business Profit Tax corresponding to 2.5%. Finally, MVR 123.35 million that is equivalent to 6.9% of the total amount was generated from other taxes and fees.
Due to the spike in the number of COVID-19 cases, MIRA urges all seeking its services to switch to online and digital service options. To encourage this, changes have also been made to the opening hours of their Taxpayer Service Center and Hulhumale' Tax Collection Center whilst tokens will now be issued via MIRA mobile application and the QueueBee application.