The Min­istry of Fi­nance has re­leased a com­pre­hen­sive list of food items that will be free from val­ue-added tax (VAT) come No­vem­ber 1. 

A re­lease from the min­istry yes­ter­day de­tailed the list­ing, as it sought to ad­dress crit­i­cism in the pub­lic do­main to­wards Min­is­ter of Fi­nance Colm Im­bert fol­low­ing Mon­day’s Bud­get pre­sen­ta­tion. 

It not­ed that the list giv­en in Par­lia­ment was not an ex­haus­tive list but “was sim­ply de­signed to il­lus­trate some of the most com­mon­ly pur­chased items in su­per­mar­kets by most house­holds, where the Gov­ern­ment can in­flu­ence the prices of these items down­wards by mak­ing them free of VAT.”

On the is­sue of cur­ry, the min­istry said its in­clu­sion was an er­ror. 

“That was in­deed an er­ror on the list of items rec­om­mend­ed for re­moval of VAT that was sent by the Su­per­mar­ket As­so­ci­a­tion to the Min­is­ter on Sun­day, Oc­to­ber 3 and not picked up by the tech­nocrats in the Min­istry,” the re­lease said. 

How­ev­er, the Min­is­ter thanked the as­so­ci­a­tion for its as­sis­tance and did not place any blame on it for the er­ror. 

It al­so not­ed that not all canned meats are free of VAT.

“For ex­am­ple, canned sausages are NOT VAT free at present, nor are any oth­er canned meats, oth­er than corned beef. Sim­i­lar­ly, while sar­dines and smoked her­ring are free of VAT, Tu­na and Mack­er­el are NOT VAT free at present, as is al­so the case with oth­er canned fish. Fur­ther, no canned veg­eta­bles are cur­rent­ly free of VAT, such as corn, peas and mixed veg­eta­bles,” it said. 

The re­lease not­ed that the list was very care­ful­ly cho­sen in col­lab­o­ra­tion with var­i­ous stake­hold­ers “to rep­re­sent the most com­mon­ly used foods that are cur­rent­ly sub­ject to VAT.”

“The ze­ro-rat­ed list will be amend­ed from time to time, to add more ba­sic items as cir­cum­stances re­quire and de­serve, and as funds per­mit,” the min­istry said.

Vat free food items from No­vem­ber 1:

• Veg­etable/Soya Bean Oil
• Olive Oil
• Co­conut Oil
• Canola Oil
• Ghee
• Peanut But­ter
• Black Pep­per And Oth­er Spices
• Fam­i­ly Ce­re­al
• Kid’s Ce­re­als
• Hot Ce­re­al Oats
• Milk Sub­sti­tute
• Con­densed Milk
• In­stant Cof­fee
• Ground Cof­fee
• Steel Cut Oats
• Black Tea (3kg And Un­der)
• Green Tea (3kg And Un­der)
• Or­ange Juice
• Ap­ple Juice
• Still Wa­ter (Bot­tled Wa­ter)
• Sea­soned Meat
• ↓Sausages, Canned Or Oth­er­wise Pack­aged
• Canned Tu­na
• Canned Mack­er­el
• Canned Peas
• Canned Beans
• Canned Corn
• Canned Mixed Veg­eta­bles
• May­on­naise
• Ketchup
• Roti Skin
• Soup (Pack­aged)
• Geera (Crushed Or Ground)
• Soya Chunks
• Soya Minced
• Ground Dhal
• Cheese Slices
• Ta­ble But­ter
• Pig­tail
• Ham Slices
• Turkey Slices
• Chick­en Lunch­meats
• Bologna
• Fresh Juice
• Bis­cuits And Crack­ers