Today, world crude oil prices fell to $90 a barrel. That’s good news
if you’re a consumer, bad news if you’re a tax collector. First
the good news, though the prices at pumps in Belize won’t go down immediately,
if the next shipment of oil leaves soon – while prices are at their lowest
since February – the pump price that you pay should go down sharply. The
bad news is that government was hoping to collect $18 million on a windfall
tax which kicks in when oil goes over $90 a barrel.
That tax just came into effect on September first, so in the two weeks –
they only collected a few thousand dollars – and if the price continues
to go down – that may be all they’ll get. The worse news is that
the other $69 million in revenue that government was hoping to collect from
income tax, profit sharing, production sharing and its 10% equity was based
on a projection of the price of oil being at $130 a barrel.
It’s at $90 now, so if this price holds – you can slice that revenue
projection by about 30% - possibly amounting to losses in the tens of millions
for government. The windfall threshold of $90 had been seriously criticized
by PUP Deputy Leader Mark Espat in the House; he argues that the threshold should
have been at $50 a barrel – that beyond that price BNE had recovered its
cost of investment and was basically creaming off the top.
But beyond the bickering over figures, what heads of households will be happy
to hear is that the price of a tank of butane has decreased to $124 per hundred
pound tank, undelivered in Belize City. That’s down from a high of $132
in early July.
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