Azerbaijan likely to expand VAT-free import list

The Azerbaijan government is developing measures to improve entrepreneurship activities under anti-recessionary, permanent parliamentary committee on economic policy head Ziyad Samedzade said.

"At present possibility of expanding list of Value Added Tax (VAT)-free goods is under consideration," Samedzade said.

In this case there should not be large scale, because the government will more probably apply it on goods, equipment and technique which are not produced in the country and imported to set up local production, he assured.

The global financial crisis necessitates conducting system analysis into legislation in economy and necessary actions are taken in this field.

"At the Azerbaijani president's instruction, economic agencies are currently developing concrete proposals to cut tax burden, because it is necessary to offer necessary conditions to support business," Samedzade said.

Azerbaijan has necessary conditions, good investment climate, producers exporting their products abroad and in such conditions it will be expedient to reduce VAT.

"Any cut requires appropriate calculations and it is impossible to name exact figure to cut the VAT without analysis of [public] budget expense and income," he stressed.

The Azerbaijani Taxes Ministry offers reducing VAT rate by 1 percent to 17 percent and profit tax by two percent to 20 percent.

/Trend Capital/