The Customs Division of the Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA) for the year 2020 exceeded its revenue target by some Ghs 1.4 billion.
This is according to the Commissioner of the Customs Division of the GRA, Colonel Kwadwo Damoah (Rtd).
He made the disclosure on Sunday, January 31, during an interview on Eye on Port speaking on the topic “Positioning Customs for a Sustainable Supply Chain.”
Commissioner Damoah during the interview revealed that revenue target for the Customs Division per the 2020 budget was originally Ghs 13.3 billion, but was revised to Ghs 10.9 billion due to the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Against a revised revenue target of Ghs 10.9 billion for the year 2020, the Customs Division mobilized revenue totaling Ghs 12.3 billion.
“We would have been able to achieve our target of Ghs 13.3 billion had it not been the reduction in import duties due to reduced imports as a result of the pandemic which contracted imports. So that’s how come our revenue target was affected, but despite that we were able to exceed our revised target by Ghs 1.4 billion,” he said.
Looking forward, Commissioner Damoah revealed the Customs Division’s ambitious goal of raking in for government, some Ghs 15 billion in total duties mobilization for 2021.
“We are yet to have a substantive target for 2021, because it is only when the Finance Minister goes to Parliament to announce it in the budget reading that we can assert that this or that is our target revenue for this year. But we have done our own analysis and forecasts and done some projections on what we should be able to achieve as revenue target for this year,” he said [sic].
“Based on the fact that we were able to exceed our target for last year and considering the Ghs 60 billion revenue target of the GRA for this year, we are looking at mobilizing some Ghs 15 billion for this year. That might be ambitious, but we are challenging ourselves and praying that Covid-19 does not become as devastating as it was last year,” he added.
