Book Law: Government formalizes law that permanently exempts texts from VAT

The Executive Branch promulgated this morning Law 31893“of strategic measures and economic and tax provisions for the strengthening and positioning of the book and reading ecosystem”, which promotes reading through tax exemptions, such as the General Sales Tax (IGV), for the dissemination from books.

Some of the benefits include the tax refund of the VAT and the exemption from Income Tax (IR) on the royalties that, due to copyright, authors and translators, both national and foreign, would receive.

Likewise, the Peruvian Government plans to expand the use of the Fondolibro budget for economic incentives aimed at works and reading. For this reason, the Ministry of Culture will implement the Book Ecosystem Observatory.

“The State promotes the training or certification of labor skills of agents who participate in the publishing industry, reading mediators, librarians and operators of the National Library System,” the document states.

Tax exemption is not universal. Law 31893 clarifies that comic strips that do not have scientific, educational or cultural content, or publications on fashion, games of chance and adult content, among others, will not be subject to VAT exemption on import or sales.

Publishers have the right to a tax refund equivalent to the VAT recorded separately in the payment receipts corresponding to their acquisitions and imports of capital goods, raw materials, supplies, electronic pre-press services and graphic services intended for the production of books and related publishing products. . This refund will be available starting this week.

Meanwhile, the Exemption from IR on copyright royalties comes into effect as of January 1, 2024. The royalties received by national and foreign authors and translators, domiciled and not domiciled in the country, for books or related publishing products are exempt from this.