Excise Revenue Surges on Vehicle Imports; Cigarette Taxes Drop
- CNL Reporter
- August 6, 2025
- News
- Vehicle Imports
- 0 Comments
Sri Lanka has collected 129 billion rupees from excise duties from vehicles in the first half of 2025, after imports were liberalized, up from 29.6 billion rupees last year, a Finance Ministry report showed.
Imported cars also have a 20 percent duty, which the government loses if the vehicle is locally assembled as well as value added tax.Import value added tax and duty also went up.
Excise duty from cigarettes fell 17.9 percent to 44 billion rupees, amid high excise driven price hikes which has promoted smuggling and a shift to beedi which is cheaper but has no filter.
Excise duty from petroleum increased by 15.5 percent to 112 billion rupees up to June from 97 billion rupees last year. Excise duty from alcohol increased by 9.2 percent to 108.2 billion rupees up to June from 99.1 billion rupees last year.
