The Ghana Customs Service has been at pains in the last few hours to offer further explanations on the imposition of taxes on energy and acquisition of knowledge - generators and computers.

The special advisor to the Service, Mr Mitchell Opoku-Boamah said the duties and other taxes were passed under a certificate of urgency under the 1998 Budget Statement.

He further elaborated more taxes on energy to include duties on primary cell batteries, lanterns and candles, which are mostly used by Ghanaians in the rural areas. These attract import duty of a whooping 25 per cent.

However, he added that the 5 per cent duty on generators is concessionary, in other words, generators imported into the country for industrial and commercial purposes but have a generating capacity of less than the 375 KVA are exempt from the 5 percent import duty. Domestic users have to pay the tax.

Mr. Opoku Boamah said computers, as revealed in the 1998 budget attract 15 percent sales tax but are exempt from import duty.

Equipment used in the generating of power from solar energy are however zero-rated but solar water heaters would now attract a 30 per cent tax: 15 per cent import duty and 15 per cent sales tax.

The new taxes, Mr. Opoku Boamah said are part of an on going exercise, started last year to broaden the tax base and rationalize tariffs.

Economic and political observers believe that the taxes on both energy and the acquisition of knowledge are very poorly thought through. Even in a developed country such as UK, there are no taxes on energy and knowledge. Since the imposition of VAT, a tax deemed to broaden the tax base, the UK for almost three decades levied no tax on energy until a couple of years ago when a minimal tax rate was imposed.

It is evident that like UK, Ghana imposes no tax on primary tools for the acquisition of knowledge such as books, however computers ought to be included in the "primary" category for a developing country, one observer said.