BAGUIO CITY?Towns and provinces hosting mining operations will receive next year their share of taxes paid by mining firms in 2009, an official of the Mines and Geosciences Bureau (MGB) said on Friday.

The gross production value of mineral commodities which the industry exported or processed between January and September already amounts to P88.9 billion ($2 billion), said Glenn Noble, chief of the MGB Mineral Economics, Information and Publications Division.

Noble made the announcement during the National Mine Safety and Environment Conference held here.

Last year, the mining industry produced ore equivalent to P97.41 billion ($2.11 billion), Noble said.

The mines contributed 1.2 percent ($2.01 billion) to the year?s gross domestic product, for which companies paid up to P7.22 billion, he said.

Since 2008, the government had labored to correct the process of releasing to local governments their share of taxes from mining firms, which often took more than two years, Noble said.

He said the current process compelled Congress to determine how much a company should pay when it draws up the national appropriations act ?because there is usually no information available when the budget is crafted.?

Once the estimates are included in the budget, local governments are required to undergo a validation process with the Department of Budget and Management, he said.

A new procedure provides Congress accurate information on the taxes mining firms pay for the first three quarters, Noble said. This would allow local governments to receive their share from taxes collected on the first nine months.

A second budgetary allocation would be drawn up by Congress to address the last quarter share from mining taxes, Noble said.

In 2005, for example, the state-owned Philippine Information Agency reported that excise tax payments by mining companies to the national government amounted to P489.57 million ($10.88 million), and the share of local governments from these taxes shot up to P195.83 million that year.

But local mining communities, like Compostela Valley, still petitioned the government in 2007 for a faster allotment process because the provinces have not been able to use these shares.

The Chamber of Mines of the Philippines also endorsed a measure filed by Baguio City Representative Mauricio Domogan, which required companies to remit directly to local governments their 40-percent share of mining taxes and royalties.

House Bill No. 1020 (National Wealth Bill) was passed by the House of Representatives in 2007, but Domogan failed to secure a counterpart measure in the Senate, forcing the lawmaker to re-file the measure.

The measure amends provisions of the 1991 Local Government Code which address the national wealth tax.

Noble said mining investments this year run up to $2.43 billion and would increase to $14.8 billion by 2013 once all exploration projects are completed here.

Metals prices last week improved in the global market, with gold breaching $1,000 to $1,104 per ounce while copper prices reached $2.97 a pound, Noble said. Vincent Cabreza, Inquirer Northern Luzon