- 🔹 Bangladesh’s Budget 2026/27 introduces a simplified turnover tax regime for small and retail businesses, allowing them to pay a fixed amount based on business category and location — without maintaining VAT records, preserving invoices, or filing VAT returns. [pwc.com]
- 🔹 Significant VAT exemptions are extended or newly introduced, including for startup enterprises (until 2035), freelancers and content creators, agricultural inputs, electric vehicles, and technology products, while VAT on locally manufactured appliances is reduced from 15% to 7.5%. [thedailystar.net]
- 🔹 The import duty, regulatory duty, and supplementary duty framework is comprehensively restructured: import duties are reduced on 69 products, the regulatory duty structure is simplified from 9 tiers to 6, and regulatory duties are withdrawn on 113 products. [pwc.com]
Article: Bangladesh’s National Budget for fiscal year 2026/27, presented to parliament on 11 June 2026, introduces transformative changes to the indirect tax framework aimed at stimulating growth and broadening the formal tax base. The flagship measure is a new simplified turnover tax regime for small and retail businesses, where eligible entities pay a modest fixed amount based on their category and location — entirely bypassing the standard VAT compliance architecture of record-keeping, invoice preservation, and return filing. Payments are processed through banks or mobile financial services. On the VAT front, the budget delivers an extensive package of exemptions: services provided by registered startups (including imported services and premises rental) are exempt until 2035; freelancers and content creators are exempt from VAT; agricultural fertilizers at the trading stage and cardiac stents at the supplier stage become VAT-free. Conditional VAT exemptions for mobile phone, computer, and electric vehicle manufacturing are extended to 2030, and locally manufactured appliances benefit from a halved 7.5% rate. The customs and trade duty framework undergoes significant rationalization: import duties are reduced on 69 products; the 9-tier regulatory duty structure is consolidated to 6 tiers; supplementary duty is reduced or withdrawn on 9 products; and regulatory duties are eliminated on 113 products. The solar energy sector benefits from 0% duty on essential components until 2031, and electric vehicle manufacturers receive tiered duty exemptions based on their level of value addition. [pwc.com], [thedailystar.net]
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