Income Tax Law approved by Oman’s State Council

Muscat: The draft of Income Tax, Foreign Capital Investment and Insurance Companies laws was approved by the State Council on Tuesday.
At the beginning of the session, the Chairman of the State Council delivered a speech pointing out the economic committee’s report in which its had raised a number of important issues about encouraging the mining industry.
The committee provided the criteria for the concessions for the national industries that add value to the national economy and generate employment and training opportunities.
The committee also highlighted tools for integration with other sectors associated with mining.
The Chairman of the Economic Committee delivered a speech where he pointed out that the government proposed to make amendment to 106 articles of which Majlis Al Shura approved amending 101 articles (95 per cent of the proposed amendments by the government).
Out of the proposed 106 articles by the government, 69 articles were approved by the government without any amendments by both Majlis Al Shura and the State Council.
The State Council agreed on the amendments made by Majlis Al Shura on 18 articles.
The State Council and Majlis Al Shura agreed on the amendments made on 14 articles with some cosmetic changes made to the drafting of these articles.
The Chairman of the Economic Committee said that the Committee used an approach that takes into consideration the financial tools, namely the public expenditures and taxes, which aim at maintaining stability of prices, ensuring optimum utilization of all production elements in the economy, redistribution of income and enhancing economic growth rates.
The Chairman of the Economic Committee said that the Committee agreed with the government and Majlis Al Shura on increasing the income tax to 15 per cent of the taxable income of any Omani company or establishment or business for any tax year.
The Committee believes that this rate should include all business entities without any exception or preferential treatment as this will ensure fair treatment for everyone.
He added that within the efforts made by the Committee to benefit from expertise of some organisations, the Committee hosted the Chairman of the Public Authority for Mining and discussed with him the current situation for the sector and the need to treat the mining organisations and business organisations on equal footing without any preferential treatment.
It should be noted that the detailed discussions by members for the three draft laws took into consideration that current and future circumstances witnessed by the Sultanate.
They also did their best to ensure that the amendments will not have negative effect on the production stakeholders and will maintain the rights of both producers and consumers as well.
During the meeting, the minutes of the 3rd regular session of the first annual sitting of the sixth term was approved.
The Council held its fourth sitting of the first annual session of the sixth term under the chair of Dr. Yahya bin Mahfoudh Al Mantheri ,Chairman of the State Council.