By Lawrence Agcaoili

Collections of the Bureau of Customs fell nearly 7 percent in the first two months of the year as the Philippines started to feel the full impact of the global economic meltdown.

Sources said Customs collected P28.33 billion in January and February this year, or P2.04 billion lower than P30.37 billion last year, citing preliminary data.

The agency’s tax take in the first two months of the year was also P2.89 billion short of the P31.22-billion target for the period.

Customs officials attributed the slow collections in the first two months of the year to lower oil prices in the world market and weaker imports as a result of the global economic slowdown.

Oil prices in the world market is down to a little over $40 per barrel from a high of $147 in July last year while imports inched up just 2 percent to $56.636 billion after rising 7.2 percent to $55.514 billion in 2007.

Customs collections jumped 51.25 percent to P260.2 billion in 2008 from P209.4 billion in 2007, or P6.2 billion more than the agency’s full-year target of P254.5 billion.

The Bureau of Treasury, however, said the agency should have collected P274.06 billion due to higher oil prices and was, thus, P13.81 billion short of its collection performance.

The Finance Department has scaled down the revenue target of Customs by P39.8 billion to P277.2 billion instead of P317 billion. The agency was originally tasked to collect P310 billion this year before Finance raised the goal to P317 billion.

Finance officials attributed the lower goals to the slackening domestic economy and revised macroeconomic assumptions, including lower inflation and the contraction of both exports and imports.

Economic managers, through the Development Budget Coordination Committee, expect the domestic output as measured by GDP to expand between 3.7 percent and 4.4 percent this year, instead of 3.7 percent to 4.7 percent.

They also see exports contracting 8 percent this year and imports falling 10 percent. Inflation is expected to ease to a range of 3.0 percent to 5.0 percent, instead of the revised forecast of 6.0 percent to 8.0 percent.