Hanoi (VNA) - State budget revenue in the first half of 2020 was down 10.5percent against a year earlier and equal to just 44.2 percent of the annual estimate;the lowest since 2013, Minister of Finance Dinh Tien Dung told a conference inHanoi on July 7.

The gatheringwas held by the Ministry of Finance to review the State’s finance and budget positionin the first six months of the year and to outline tasks for the remainingmonths. Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc was in attendance.

Thirty-fourof Vietnam’s 63 cities and provinces reported first-half State budget revenues thatexceeded 50 percent of the estimate, he said. If revenues from land use feesand the sale of lottery tickets were to be excluded, however, only 14 were ableto achieve budget collections at over half of the estimate.

Statebudget collections were struck a heavy blow in the first half by COVID-19,which quickly sent the global economy into recession and severely damaged manyof Vietnam’s major partners, Dung explained.

In theface of the pandemic, the ministry came up with a number of measures to removedifficulties facing local business and production and to ensure social welfare,he continued.

Itproposed the government provide tax exemptions on imported medical materialsand equipment for the COVID-19 response and on imports of materials for variouspandemic-hit industries.

Theministry has also deferred payments of value-added tax (VAT), corporate incometax, personal income tax, and land use fees for affected companies andhousehold businesses, raised the taxable personal income threshold, and cutenvironmental protection taxes on jet fuel by 30 percent to help affected peopleand companies weather the coronavirus crisis.

Dung wenton to say that, as of the end of June, State spending accounted for 41.8percent of the annual plan.

The Statebudget provided around 15.3 trillion VND (over 658 million USD) in funding forCOVID-19 relief efforts, he said, including 4.1 trillion VND to curb the spreadof the disease and 11.3 trillion VND on supporting disease-hit people andbusinesses.

More than1.66 trillion VND was also earmarked from the reserve funding for tackling Africanswine fever nationwide and addressing the aftermath of natural disasters onproduction, he noted.

Theministry will continue giving priority to helping businesses recover from thepandemic and to attracting more investment for local economic development, hesaid.

He alsourged other ministries and localities to accelerate the disbursement of publicinvestment and increase budget collections and tighten spending to save fundsfor major tasks such as the COVID-19 and natural disaster response.

Addressing the conference, Prime Minister Nguyen XuanPhuc instructed the financial sector to persist with the goal of ensuringbudget collections, stabilising the macro economy and controlling inflation.

In the remainingmonths of the year, the sector should study and early submit to authorised authoritiesflexible and effective fiscal mechanism and policies to support economicrecovery, along with specific proposals on fiscal stimulus packages, taxincentives and resource mobilisation, PM Phuc said.

In particular,the PM stressed the requirement on accelerating the disbursement of publicinvestment capital.

He also urged theFinance Ministry to further streamline administrative procedures, especially intaxation and customs, and cut inspections./.