According to the provisions of the Tax Administration Law, the Fee and Charge Law No. 97, the business license fee is a fee related to the state’s management of production and business activities with an annual declaration period. This is considered a fixed amount of money that organizations and individuals must regularly submit annually or when starting production and business activities.

Taxpayers of the Business License Fee (excluding business households and individual businesses) newly established (including small and medium-sized enterprises converting from business households) or having additional dependent units, business locations, or starting production and business activities must file the Business License Fee declaration no later than the 30th of January of the year following the year of establishment or commencement of production and business activities. In case there is a change in capital during the year, the taxpayer of the Business License Fee must file the Business License Fee declaration no later than the 30th of January of the year following the year in which the change information occurs.

The Business License Fee declaration form is Form 01/LPMB issued with Circular No. 80/2021/TT-BTC of September 29, 2021, by the Minister of Finance.

In addition, businesses engaged in the import of agricultural products declare VAT and CIT in accordance with Decree No. 126/2020/NĐ-CP of October 19, 2020, of the Government and Circular No. 80/2021/TT-BTC of September 29, 2021, of the Minister of Finance guiding the implementation of some articles of the Law on Tax Administration. Accordingly, businesses do not declare separately for the production and business activities related to the above agricultural products but make a general declaration on VAT and CIT declaration forms when there are multiple production and business activities, specifically:

VAT:

• For taxpayers declaring under the deduction method: Declare Form No. 01/GTGT issued with Circular No. 80/2021/TT-BTC. Accordingly:
  • For the amount of input tax of imported goods and services, taxpayers declare indicators [23a], [24a] which are indicators related to imported goods and services;
  • For the amount of output tax of imported goods and services, taxpayers declare indicators [30], [31] or [32a] depending on each subject of purchasing goods according to the provisions of law.
• For taxpayers declaring under the direct method: Declare Form No. 04/GTGT issued with Circular No. 80/2021/TT-BTC.

CIT: Taxpayers declare according to the method of Revenue – Expenses (Form No. 03/TNDN issued with Circular No. 80/2021/TT-BTC) or the method of Direct Percentage on Revenue (Form No. 04/TNDN issued with Circular No. 80/2021/TT-BTC) depending on the tax declaration method registered with the tax authority.

According to the regulations of the value-added tax (VAT) policy, unprocessed agricultural products (including forest products), livestock, aquaculture, farmed and wild-caught seafood of organizations and individuals self-produced, caught, and sold and at the import stage are not subject to VAT. In addition, businesses and cooperatives pay VAT under the deduction method when selling unprocessed agricultural products, livestock, aquaculture, and seafood to businesses and cooperatives at the commercial business stage, do not have to declare and pay VAT. On the VAT invoice, the sales price line is recorded as the price without VAT, the tax rate and VAT lines are not recorded, and crossed out.

In case businesses and cooperatives pay VAT under the deduction method when selling unprocessed agricultural products, livestock, and seafood to other subjects such as business households, individuals, and other organizations and individuals, they must declare and pay VAT at a tax rate of 5%.

Business households, individual businesses, businesses, cooperatives, and other economic organizations that pay VAT under the direct method on VAT when selling unprocessed agricultural products, livestock, farmed and wild-caught seafood at the commercial business stage, declare and pay VAT at a rate of 1% of revenue.

Therefore, businesses engaged in the import and export of agricultural products should take note of the VAT tax rate that must be paid at each stage of importation, production, business, or consumption in order to issue invoices when selling goods, providing services, and fulfilling tax declaration and payment obligations in accordance with the law. Based on this, buyers have a basis for deducting input VAT and determining the deductible expenses when determining taxable income for corporate income tax purposes, provided that they have sufficient legal invoices and documents as prescribed by law.