Costa Rica considers imposing 5% cement tax on net sale price

The Costa Rican Legislative Assembly is to discuss proposing a five per cent tax on imported and locally-produced cement.

The bill establishes that "… the tax on cement produced within the national territory or imported, will be of five per cent (5%) on the net sale price, both in the case of the national producer at the level of the production plant and for the importer at the level of the dispatch or storage site, excluding the corresponding sales or value-added tax, as well as any other tax."

A statement by the Legislative Assembly explains that the funds collected from the tax will be distributed "… between different provinces and cantons of Cartago, Guanacaste, Desamparados, places where this material is produced, while the rest of the country will also benefit, what is collected from production, in any of the other provinces not considered in the previous articles, will be distributed in the form of twenty-five per cent (25%) for the canton where production occurs and the remaining seventy and five per cent (75%) in equal parts for the cantons of the respective province."