Book industry steps up pressure on Government

Ashford W. Meikle
Staff Reporter

THE BOOK Industry Association of Jamaica (BIAJ) has stepped up its pressure on the Government to restore the sector to the zero-rated status it formerly enjoyed.

"A tax on books [is] a tax on literacy," declared BIAJ board member Dorothy Noel, while speaking yesterday at an emergency meeting called by the association at the Knutsford Court Hotel in New Kingston.

Minister of Finance and Planning Dr. Omar Davies two years ago classified the book and publishing industry as a tax-exempt one. However, faced with lobbying of the BIAJ, the Government restored the zero-rated status to the industry.

Paul Bryan (left), chairman of the Book Industry Association of Jamaica (BIAJ), Dorothy Neol, (right) BIAJ executive officer, and George Davis (centre), executive director of Book Merchant Limited, at the association's meeting called to discuss 'Punitive Tax Measures' at the Knutsford Court Hotel, St. Andrew, yesterday. RUDOLPH BROWN/CHIEF PHOTOGRAPHER

A zero-rated status means that a business can claim back GCT paid on most expenses as well as inventory. On the other hand, an exempt status (also called input tax) does not allow the business to claim back any GCT paid.

'TAX ON LITERACY'

In an impassioned plea to the representatives from the Ministry of Finance at the BIAJ meeting, Mrs. Noel observed that "the imposition of GCT on ... books is a tax on literacy and a tax on literacy is a critical spoke in the wheel of national growth and development of a people." Mrs. Noel is also the publishing manager at Carlong Publishers.

The publishing executive told the audience that the imposition of the GCT "will place local production at a severe disadvantage and immediately make local publishers less competitive against foreign publishers."

IMPACT ON LOCAL PUBLISHERS

Publishing executive Franklin McGibbon said that the imposition of GCT would be devastating to local publishers. He said that the effect would be a 30 per cent increase in the price of locally-produced books as opposed to the 10 per cent jump in the cost of imported books.

Mrs. Noel said, "We are not advocating an imposition of a tax on these imported books but rather the removal from the locally-published ones."

She argued that the tax was imposed without any due diligence or appreciation of the challenges faced by the publishing industry.

"We are assuming that [the imposition of the GCT] could not be the need to collect more revenue since the amount to be collected from this small fledgling and struggling publishing industry will be negligible," she said. "It is precisely because this industry is so small and vulnerable that the effect of this tax regime change, this tax tsunami will spell disaster for this country."

According to the publishing executive, if allowed to continue, the tax would retard Jamaica's growth and development. "Our purpose here today is to ask you, the representatives of the Ministry of Finance, to join us as partners in the education process in recognising that the survival of the local book industry is the core of a country's national development.

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