Premier Hybrid Proposes Green Tax Regime For Malaysia
KUALA LUMPUR, Sept 10 (Bernama) — Premier Hybrid Cars Sdn Bhd, the country’s first franchised distributor of hybrid cars, has proposed that Malaysia come up with a green tax regime if it wants to remain a major player in the motor vehicle industry.
In a statement here today, Premier Hybrid chairman, Datuk Shahrin Zahari, said the company proposed this as it believed the current tax regime in Europe was regressive.
He said currently, such taxes were structured to hit the people who hurt the atmosphere by levying a tax on polluters.
“We propose rewarding consumers, via tax breaks for those who voluntary help reduce emissions by using renewable energy,” he said.
Shahrin said such a move would help save the government billions of ringgit a year in fuel subsidy.
“We are not saying that we will be able to help cut the fuel subsidies within a year, but if done in a structured manner, the savings to the government and environment would be substantial over a period of a decade” he said.
He said in the medium term, multinationals would be the biggest winners by switching to hybrids as they could save consumers a minimum of RM3,000 a year.
“If you are running a corporation with 50 or 100 cars, the savings are enormous … we expect this then to trickle to the consumer market,” he said.
Toyota Motor Corp, the world’s second largest carmaker by sales, announced in June its plan to produce 9,000 Camry hybrids by 2009 in Thailand, making the kingdom the first Asean country to build hybrid cars.
In 2009 Budget tabled recently, the franchise holders of hybrid cars are given 100 percent exemption on import duty and 50 percent exemption on excise duty on new completely built-up hybrid cars.
The move aims to promote Malaysia as a regional hub for hybrid cars and as incentive for local car manufacturers and assemblers to prepare for the assembly of such cars domestically.
— BERNAMA
Jom komen!