Revenues collected by the Bureau of Customs (BOC) from January to April 2020 dropped 7.29% to P179.44 billion from P193.55 billion year-on-year.
Preliminary data shows the latest figure was also 13.14% short of the P206.59-billion target for the period, BOC’s mother agency Department of Finance (DOF) said in a statement.
DOF attributed the decline to community quarantine measures in Luzon and other parts of the country implemented since mid-March 2020 to stop the spread of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19).
READ: BOC first-quarter collection falls 12.8% short of target
For April 2020 alone, BOC collections amounted to P33.97 billion, 34.27% below the P51.67 billion collected in the same period last year. It is also 40% less than the April 2020 target of P56.54 billion.
BOC sister agency Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) also recorded lower revenues from January to April this year of P527.41 billion, 25.4% below the same period last year’s collection and 0.19% short of the P528.44-billion target.
Combined revenue collection of both BIR and BOC for January to April reached P706.85 billion, P28.17 billion short of the target of P735.03 billion.
Finance Secretary Carlos Dominguez III earlier assured the Filipino people that even with the significant decline in both bureaus’ revenue collections, the country remains “financially able” to meet the unexpected challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Dominguez said the government has been able to roll out a four-pillar socioeconomic strategy to defeat COVID-19, which involves budgetary, fiscal and monetary measures with a combined value of P1.74 trillion or around 9.1% of the country’s gross domestic product.
