MAPUTO, Sept. 10 (Xinhua) -- Mozambican lost more than 340 million U.S. dollars due to the smuggling of alcoholic beverages in 2017, independent market research provider Euromonitor International said here on Monday.
According to Carla Camaio, representative of the Euromonitor in Mozambique, the country ranked second in terms of financial losses caused by alcohol smuggling, after Nigeria in Africa.
"The Mozambican state is not being able to stop the smuggling of alcoholic beverages. In total, it is 344 million dollars that the country lost last year, minus 2 million dollars, compared to Nigeria, which is the largest victim of such illicit schemes in Africa," said Camaio during a meeting on tax policy organized by the Confederation of Economic Associations (CTA) of Mozambique.
Camaio said the increase in tax evasion in Mozambique results in large part from the rise in the Specific Consumption Tax.
To deal with the situation, CTA Executive Director Eduardo Sengo said "we need to implement a sustainable tax structure in order to make legal products more accessible in the country."
South Africa, Zambia and Uganda are the other three countries among the top-5 with the highest volume of losses from alcohol smuggling.
The Mozambican Tax Authority (TA) has raised about 142.3 billion meticals (about 2.37 billion U.S. dollars) in 2018. For the authorities, the figures are slightly above the target of 222.8 billion meticals expected for the whole year.
