REPUBLIKA.CO.ID, JAKARTA -- The government tax revenues in the first six months of the year totaled Rp518.4 trillion or lower than Rp536.1 trillion in the same period last year.

"Nominally tax revenues fell Rp17.7 trillion or 3.3 percent on-year in the first half of the year," Head of the Fiscal Policy at the Finance Ministry Suahasil Nazara said, at a working meeting with the Budget Commission of the House of Representatives.

Suahasil attributed the decline in tax revenue to low price of the Indonesian crude oil in international market, saying shrinking oil price resulted in Rp11 trillion fall in income tax from the oil and gas sector.

In addition , the country has not fully recovered in its international trade performance, he said here on Wednesday.

He said as a result revenues in income tax from non oil/gas sector and value added tax fell short of expectation.

Income from tobacco excise also declined, he added.

He hoped that by the end of this year tax revenue could come close to target of Rp1,539.2 trillion after the implementation of the tax amnesty law.

The tax revenue in the first six months of the year included Rp269.5 trillion in income tax from the non-oil/gas sector, Rp16.3 trillion in income tax from the oil/gas sector and Rp167.7 trillion in luxury sales tax.

The income tax from the non-oil/gas sector was 33.8 percent of the target, the income tax from the oil/gas sector was 44.9% of the target and luxury sales tax was 35.4 percent of the target this year.

Excise revenues totaled Rp42.9 trillion or 29 percent of the target, import duties totaled Rp16 trillion or 48 percent of the target and export tax totaled Rp1.3 trillion or 51.5 percent of the target for 2016.

Total revenues from excise duty reached only Rp60.2 trillion or 32.7 percent of the target of Rp184 trillion.

Suahasil, however, told the lawmakers that he was confident the economy would grow stronger in 2017.

"Our estimate puts the country's economic growth at a higher level in 2017 . We have that confidence," he said.

He noted that the country's economy has slowed down in the past five years on internal turbulence and global pressure.

However, in 2015, the government began to launch expansive fiscal policy to boost economic growth that a reverse is expected in 2016.

"The fiscal policy is to boost economic growth. Budget spending is only for productive sector such as infrastructure and subsidy was cut on oil fuels," he said.

He said the result of the fiscal policy was shown when the economy grew 4.8 percent in 2015 up to 4.92 percent in the first quarter of 2016.

"Therefore, economic target was set higher in 2016 at 5.2 percent . We believe , there has been a turning point ," he said.

Earlier the government set macro economic growth target at 5.3 percent - 5.9 percent in 2017 in line with the projected economic growth in advanced and developing economies next year.

Bank Indonesia (BI) predicted that the country's economic growth in the second quarter of this year was 4.94 percent that in the first half of the year the economic growth still fell below 5 percent.

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