Gov’t eyes bigger share from mining revenues

MANILA, Philippines - The government is aiming to further increase its share from mining revenues, Environment Secretary Ramon Paje said yesterday.

Paje told reporters said that during a recent meeting of the Mining Industry  Coordinating Council (MICC), the Economic Cluster agreed to raise the government’s share to between eight to 10 percent from the previous target of seven to 10 percent.

The Environment Cluster has also finalized the areas that would be considered as no-go zones or areas where extractive activitites would be limited or prohibited.

Paje said that during the next meeting of the MICC, the body would deliberate on the mode of collection of taxes.

Modes of collection being considred are upfront collection and bottomline collection from gross earnings of mining firms.

Mines and Geosciences Bureau (MGB) director Leo Jasareno explained that upfront collection entails collection of excise tax based on projected earnings, while collection from the bottomline entails collection after earnings.

Paje said the MICC intends to finish the draft revenue sharing bill before the  Congress resumes session.

Under the proposed revenue sharing scheme, around five to seven percent would be collected from gross earnings, while the remaining would be obtained from windfall earnings.

Identified as no-go zones, meanwhile, are 78 ecotourism sites that have been identified by the Tourism department, while the DENR has identified 249 protected areas.

 The MICC is a joint committee of the Economic Development Cluster and the Climate Change Cluster created under Executive Order 79 tasked tp formulate a new revenue sharing scheme between the govenrment and mining companies.