Taxes from fuel marking reach P275 billion in 2 years

MANILA, Philippines — The government has collected P275.38 billion in taxes from fuel marking, nearly two years since this scheme was implemented, Finance Secretary Carlos Dominguez said.

The fuel marking scheme seeks to eliminate the presence of illicit fuel in the market.

Under the program, regulators use a chemical identifier to determine which petroleum products paid the required taxes.

If a fuel contains less than 95 percent of the marker level, the owner will be compelled to pay the taxes and face sanctions.

The Bureau of Customs monitors  imported fuel while the Bureau of Internal Revenue collects from local players.

Dominguez said the BOC accounted for 89 percent of the total at P245.6 billion while the BIR took up the remaining 11 percent at P29.78 billion.

More than 28.225 billion liters of fuel have been marked since September 2019.

By type, diesel accounted for about 61 percent of the volume at 17.2 billion liters, followed by gasoline at 10.86 billion liters and kerosene at 150.11 million liters.

By source, Petron Corp. led all industry players with a share of 22.69 percent of marked fuel at 6.4 billion liters, ahead of Pilipinas Shell Petroleum Corp. with 18.98 percent at 5.35 billion liters.

Unioil registered 10.31 percent of the volume at 2.91 billion liters, followed by Seaoil Philippines, Phoenix Petroleum Philippines Inc. and Insular Oil Corp., all with shares of around eight percent each.