Following the entry into force of the Sign Law, agencies engaged in providing printed advertising services estimate that the cost of billboards will increase by 30% due to the new tax payments to be made to the municipalities.
According to the Assembly, the purpose of the Law is to establish the legal framework to regulate the advertising and propaganda carried out by means of signs located in the municipalities of the country, based on urban, suburban and rural planning and development, as well as technological advances.
In this scenario of economic crisis, falling tax revenues and the need to finance recovery programs, in Guatemala and Costa Rica it is already proposed to increase current taxes and create new ones.
Guatemalan authorities are already beginning to discuss the fiscal policy they will apply in 2021, when the economy will have to face the effects of the economic crisis generated by the covid-19 outbreak.
The Legislative Assembly approved in second debate a bill that aims to tax in the country the sale and self-consumption of imported or locally produced cement.
The initiative, which was approved in the first debate in the Assembly in mid-February and is still pending approval by the Executive Branch, establishes that the tax will be on imported cement produced nationally, in bags or in bulk, for sale or self-consumption, of any kind, whose destination is the consumption and marketing of the product nationally.
As a result of the tax reform implemented in February 2019, at the beginning of 2020 the prices of beverages increased, mainly soft drinks sold in plastic containers.
In February of last year, the Ortega regime approved the reform of the Tax Agreement Law, which consisted of increasing income tax from 1% to 2% for medium sized companies with higher incomes, and from 1% to 3% for large taxpayers.
The Ortega administration rejected the request of Nicaraguan coffee growers, who requested that the tax of one dollar per quintal exported be waived for the 2020-2021 harvest.
The decision to start charging from next year was published by the Ministry of Development, Industry and Commerce (Mific) in the October 15, 2019 edition of La Gaceta.
The funds collected from the producers will be managed by the National Commission for the Transformation and Development of Coffee Culture (Conatradec), as stipulated in the Law for the Transformation and Development of Coffee Culture, which was amended in August 2019.
In Nicaragua, authorities reported a decision to suspend collection of the additional fee of $0.05 for each kilogram exported or imported by air.
The extra charge came into effect last April 25, but from the beginning the private sector spoke out against it, because it was argued that the tariff that the Nicaraguan government would apply, would put some local companies on the border of closure and cause a decrease of about $50 million annually.
Since April 25, the Ortega administration in Nicaragua is charging an additional fee of $0.05 for each kilogram exported or imported by air.
For the country's business sector, the charge applied by the Nicaraguan government has some local companies on the verge of closure and will cause a drop of about $50 million annually.
An announcement has been made that the Legislature will resume discussion of approving the Signs Act, which aims to charge an annual tax on advertising signs installed on streets and roads.
As yet no date has been announced for the return to the discussion of the rules, but consultation is already taking place with the 153 municipalities of the country. The tax proposed, for each sign, varies depending on the size, type of structure and placement.
With the reform to the law on Tax Concentration non-resident investors in the country will have to pay 15% instead of 10% on income earned from capital.
According to Juan Sebastian Chamorro, executive director of the Nicaraguan Foundation for Economic and Social Development, the new reform "... is a positive thing for the country because it will generate an increase in the collection of such taxes but is a negative blow to natural and legal non residents because the Revenue Department will no longer deduct 10% on capital transfers, but rather 15 %. "
The Superior Council of Private Enterprise opposes the proposed "patriotic tax" of 35% on Costa Rican products and services.
The proposal by the Nicaraguan former Foreign Minister Francisco Aguirre, to charge a 35% tariff on products entering from Costa Rica has been rejected by the Superior Council of Private Enterprise (Cosep). The destination of the proposed tax revenue would have been used to cover expenses with the International Court of Justice where both countries maintain a border dispute.
The Government has abolished the regulations of the Tax Coalition Law which created new taxes and fiscal measures.
Jose Adam Aguerri, head of the Superior Council of Private Enterprise announced that the regulations on the Tax Coalition Law will be canceled by the Government of the country.
"President Daniel Ortega signed an order repealing the controversial decree 06-2014 containing the regulations.
Nicaraguan coffee growers are opposing payment of $3 per quintal of coffee for the creation of the Fund for Transformation and Development of Coffee.
Laprensa.com.ni reports that "through the National Transformation and Development of Coffee Program, the government will create by law an obligation for coffee growers to give $3 per quintal exported during the next two coffee cycles.
The main freight union of Central America has issued an ultimatum to the government of El Salvador to modify the collection of the new tax levied at customs offices.
Representatives of these unions which integrate the Central American Council of Transport have given a deadline of May 31 to amend this charge, otherwise on that date, if Congress has not amended the law which created the new tax, the truckers will go on strike for an undefined period causing heavy losses to Central American companies.
And apparently for bureaucracies in general, including those of international organizations; an "expert" from the Inter-American Development Bank is supporting tax reform in Costa Rica.
Although officially the IDB "does not advocate a tax burden or specific tax policy," one of its officials warmly supports the project to increase the tax burden to support the Costa Rican economy, to the point of suggesting that the tax burden be similar to Argentina’s.
While other Central American countries are preparing taxes to combat insecurity, Nicaragua declares that it is not an appropriate option.
The president of Guatemala, Alvaro Colom, proposed to his peers in the isthmus region the creation of specific tax to combat organized crime and the violence it generates.
Although the proposal didn’t prosper at the meeting of the Council of Finance Ministers and Central Finance, both Costa Rica, El Salvador and Honduras are working on the implementation of a national tax for their own security plans.
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