Vietnam: What is the Law on Value Added Tax 2024? Where to download the Law on Value Added Tax 2024?

Vietnam: What is the Law on Value Added Tax 2024? Where to download the Law on Value Added Tax 2024?

On November 26, 2024, at the 8th Session, the National Assembly voted in favor and officially passed the Law on Value Added Tax 2024.

The Law on Value Added Tax 2024, No. 48/2024/QH15 amends the Law on Value Added Tax 2008 and includes 4 chapters and 17 articles.

Download the Law on Value Added Tax 2024 here

What are 26 goods and services exempt from VAT in Vietnam from July 1, 2025?

Pursuant to Article 5 of the Law on Value Added Tax 2024, the regulations on 26 groups exempt from VAT are as follows:

(1) Products from planted crops, planted forests, livestock, aquaculture, or caught fish that have not been processed into other products or only undergone ordinary preliminary processing, sold by self-producing or self-catching organizations, individuals, and at import stage.

(2) Breeding stock products in accordance with the law on livestock breeding, genetic plant materials as per the law on cultivation.

(3) Animal feed in accordance with the law on husbandry; aquatic feed as per the law on aquaculture.

(4) Salt produced from seawater, natural rock salt, refined salt, iodized salt with sodium chloride (NaCl) as the main component.

(5) Housing belonging to public property sold by the State to tenants.

(6) Irrigation services; land plowing; dredging of in-field canals, trenches for agricultural production; agricultural product harvesting services.

(7) Land use rights transfer.

(8) Life insurance, health insurance, student insurance, and other human-related insurance services; livestock insurance, plant insurance, and other agricultural insurance; insurance for ships, vessels, equipment, and other necessary instruments directly serving fishing; reinsurance; insurance for oil projects, rigs, and foreign-owned oil tankers hired by oil&gas contractors or foreign subcontractors operating in Vietnamese waters or overlapping waters under joint development policies.

(9) Financial services, banking, securities trading, and commerce as follows:

- Credit services as prescribed by law on credit institutions and fees stated specifically in the Loan Agreement between the Government of Vietnam and the foreign lender;

- Lending services by non-credit institutions;

- Securities trading including securities brokerage, proprietary trading, securities underwriting, investment advisory, fund management, and securities portfolio management as per the securities law;

- Capital transfer including partial or entire investment capital transfers to other economic organizations (regardless of forming a new legal entity), transferring securities, transferring capital contribution rights, and other forms of capital transfer as regulated, including the sale of enterprises to others for production, business operations that inherit all rights and obligations according to the law. This excludes project investments, asset sales;

- Debt sales including transfers of payables and receivables;

- Foreign exchange trading;

- Derivative products as specified by the law on credit institutions, securities law, and commercial law, including interest rate swaps, forwards, futures, options, and other derivatives;

- Disposal of secured assets for entities wholly owned by the State established to manage bad loans of Vietnamese credit institutions.

(10) Medical services, veterinary services as follows:

- Healthcare services including medical examination, treatment, prevention, family planning, health care and rehabilitation; services for the elderly, disabled; patient transportation, room, and bed rentals at medical facilities; testing, imaging; blood and blood products for patient use.

- Care services for the elderly, disabled including medical care, nutrition, and cultural, sports, entertainment, physical therapy, rehabilitation activities.

Cases where medical service packages regulated by the Ministry of Health include drug use, revenues from these drugs within the medical service package are not subject to VAT;

- Veterinary services including disease examination, treatment, and prevention for animals.

(11) Funeral services.

(12) Repair, maintenance, construction activities funded by at least 50% of humanitarian aid funds, communal contributions for historical-cultural relics, monuments, cultural, artistic works, public, social infrastructure, housing for social policy beneficiaries.

(13) Educational and vocational training activities as provided by education law.

(14) Broadcasting by the State budget.

(15) Publishing, importing, distributing newspapers, magazines, newsletters, specific issues, political books, textbooks, legal documents, scientific-technical books, books serving external information, books in ethnic minority scripts, propaganda pictures, and posters, as well as audio-visual recordings, electronic data; money and printing thereof.

(16) Public passenger transport services by buses, trams, inland water transport.

(17) Machinery, equipment, spare parts, materials not produced domestically, necessary for direct research, development, oil&gas exploration; aircraft, helicopters, rigs, ships not produced domestically required for establishing fixed assets of enterprises or leased for production, business, leasing.

(18) Defense and security products according to lists issued by the Minister of National Defense, Public Security; imported products, services for defense, security under lists by the Prime Minister of Vietnam.

(19) Imported goods in cases of humanitarian aid, non-refundable aid; goods, services sold to foreign organizations, international entities for non-refundable aid to Vietnam.

(20) Transferred goods, transiting through Vietnam; temporary imports for re-export; temporary exports for re-import; imported materials for export manufacturing under contracts with foreigners; goods, services between non-tariff zones.

Goods imported by financial leasing companies transported directly into non-tariff zones for leasing.

(21) Technology transfer under the Technology Transfer Law; intellectual property rights transfer per the Intellectual Property Law; software products, services according to law.

(22) Gold bullion, ingots not crafted into jewelry or other products at import stage.

(23) Exported products being unprocessed natural resources, exported processed natural resources following lists by the Government conforming to state policy discouraging raw materials exportation.

(24) Artificial products replacing body parts, including long-term implants; crutches, wheelchairs, and specialized aids for the disabled.

(25) Goods, services of households, individuals with annual revenue not exceeding 200 million dong; non-business assets sold not subject to VAT; national reserves sold; statutory fees, charges collections.

(26) Imported goods in the following cases:

- Gifts to state agencies, political, social, professional-political groups, armed forces within duty-free limits under export, import tax laws;

- Gifts borne within duty-free limits under tax regulations from foreign entities to Vietnamese individuals; personal belongings under diplomatic privileges and moving assets within duty-free limits;

- Duty-free luggage under export, import tax laws;

- Donated goods for disasters, pandemics, warfare recovery as per Vietnam Government regulations;

- Cross-border traded goods for border residents’ production, consumption within duty-free limits under tax laws;

- National relics, artifacts under cultural heritage import by competent state authorities.

When does the Law on Value Added Tax 2024 come into effect in Vietnam?

According to Article 18 of the Law on Value Added Tax 2024, it becomes effective from July 1, 2025, except:

Revenue regulations for households, business individuals exempt from tax as per Clause 25, Article 5, and Article 17 taking effect from January 1, 2026.

Furthermore, the Law on Value Added Tax 2008, modified by 2013 Amended VAT Law, 2014 Amended Various Tax Laws, and 2016 Amended VAT, Special Consumption, and Tax Administration Laws, ceases effects from the effectivity of the Law on Value Added Tax 2024.