The island’s leading importer of electric vehicles is asking Government to scrap all taxes and duties on these cars to make them more affordable for the average Barbadian to own as the country moves towards almost 100 per cent renewable energy usage by 2030.
Speaking against the backdrop of the recent announcement by Prime Minister Mia Mottley that Government intends to review its tax policy on electric vehicles, Director of Megapower Simon Richards saidthat if the company’s suggestions are accepted, the existing price of a clean energy car would tumble from $100,000 to between $75,000 and $80,000.
“The taxation on electric cars is currently: excise and import duties are 10 per cent and 20 per cent plus the VAT. In the developed countries such as America and Europe, they give you subsidies. It’s duty-free and you get money back. So if we can remove all the duties and the VAT, that would really be a good step forward and that would bring them down to a level where they are more affordable,” Richards told Barbados TODAY.
He said if this happens there would be a greater uptake resulting in a speedier replacement of the gasoline and diesel cars on the road. “The sooner we do it, the sooner we make the foreign exchange savings on carbon emissions and savings in the health of the nation,” he added.
Asked if Barbadians are showing an interest in these vehicles, the Megapower director replied: “Yes, the best-selling car in Barbados right now is the MG electric car, it outsells all the other cars. So it’s already there, but there is only one model that is selling very well. Whereas the other garages like Simpson Motors are selling 10 or 12 different models of cars.”
Richards said that since his company, which secures 95 per cent of the local market launched that model one and a half years ago, it has placed 150 on the roads during that period.
“The real story is that a lot of that was through COVID and launching of a new product. Right now we are importing 20 to 30 vehicles per month. There is still not enough, there is still 250 new cars per month overall coming in. So, only about eight per cent of electric cars are coming in and that needs to change. I would like 100 per cent of all new cars to be electric over the next six to eight years or so,” he said.
Richards also listed a number of other incentives which the Government could introduce to encourage Barbadians to help boost the country’s drive towards “green” transport.
“The road licencing…the licence costs…$400 from $25 could be waived for electric cars. That could be an easy incentive; you could have parking in Bridgetown on the street for electric vehicles or free parking; you could subsidise the charging network. If the charging network is robust that would encourage more people. You could give company cars tax breaks, company car drivers tax breaks for choosing electric vehicles over other cars. So there are a lot of things that are being done in other countries that can be done in Barbados as well,” the company executive told Barbados TODAY. emmanueljoseph@barbadostoday.bb
