THE Cagayan de Oro City Government has collected P704 million in business taxes in January 2023, the Office of the City Treasurer reported.

According to the said office, it is 36 percent or P185 million more than what was collected in the same period last year, which is P519 million.

The financial managers of the City Government are confident that the revenue collection of the city in 2023 will be at par or even surpass pre-pandemic levels.

Cagayan de Oro has registered an average of 10 percent year-on-year increase in revenue collection before the pandemic.

Based on the data from the Office of the City Treasurer, the business tax collection in the first month of 2019 was P600,047,438. In 2020, it increased by 21 percent at P724,461,480.

In 2021, business tax collection in Cagayan de Oro decreased by 31 percent, collecting only P499,827,765 due to the pandemic.

According to City Treasurer Jasmin Maagad, the increase in the business tax collection in Cagayan de Oro can be attributed to the increase in the gross sales of businesses in the city following the recovery of the businesses from the economic slump brought by the pandemic.

City Mayor Rolando "Klarex" Uy, for his part, expressed his gratitude to the business sector for supporting the City Government's economic recovery efforts.