Egypt adds a specific EGP 20 per-1,000-cubic-foot tax on natural gas

What changed in detail

Law No. 149 of 2026, amending the VAT Law issued by Law No. 67 of 2016, was published in Egypt’s Official Gazette, issue No. 30 bis (a), on 28 July 2026 and applies from the following day. It adds a new item 17 to the first schedule of goods and services attached to the VAT Law, imposing a specific tax of EGP 20 per thousand cubic feet on natural gas, and repeals items 8 and 10 of that same schedule.

What it means

This is a specific tax, not an ad valorem rate — EGP 20 per 1,000 cubic feet, fixed regardless of what the gas actually sells for. That has systems consequences: a rate-table entry built to apply a percentage to a taxable value cannot model it, and needs a per-unit charge keyed to volume instead. The removal of items 8 and 10 from the same schedule should be retired from rate tables at the same moment item 17 is added, since both changes come from the same amendment. This is one limb of Law No. 149 of 2026; the same Law separately cut VAT to 5% on production machinery and medical devices (recorded here), narrowed the VAT credit-balance refund test, and added a new machinery-suspension relief — each is its own mechanism, with its own record.