Overdue taxes in the first nine months of the year reached a level of 6.8 percent of total tax collections, with amounts owed by State-owned enterprises accounting for over 13 percent of the total.

The figures were released by the General Department of Taxation at a meeting held in Hanoi on October 11 to review State budget utilisation so far this year.

Total tax collections in the nine-month period were at 67 percent of set targets, while total State spending amounted to 643 trillion VND (30 billion USD), or 4.5 percent increase over the same period of last year.

Value-added tax payments have also been extended for over 190,000 businesses, representing uncollected taxes totalling 11 trillion VND (523.8 million USD), while corporate income taxes have been delayed for 71,000 companies, for an additional total of 2.9 trillion VND (138 million USD).

Uncollected land use fees were also estimated to have totalled 250 billion VND (11.9 million USD) by the end of September.

Deputy Minister of Finance Vu Thi Mai told the meeting that the ministry had established a unit to review corporate income taxation, proposing a rate less than the current 25 percent.

She also told the meeting that the ministry had submitted to the Government a draft circular to provide guidelines on the revised Law on Securities and was working with the State Bank of Vietnam to develop the stock market.-VNA