Tanzania revises its VAT exemption schedule for pet food, fishing yarn, aircraft parts and cotton garments

What changed in detail

Section 96 of Tanzania’s Finance Act, 2026 (Act No. 2 of 2026) amends Part I of the Schedule to the Value Added Tax Act (Cap. 148) in several places. Dog or cat food put up for retail sale (HS 2309.10.00) is excluded from an existing feeding-related exemption item. The description of the exempt, locally manufactured fishing net (HS 5608.11.00) is substituted, and polyester fishing yarn used exclusively to manufacture fishing net (HS 5402.20.00) is added as a newly exempt input. The description of exempt dairy packaging materials (HS 3920.30.90, 3923.30.00, 4819.10.00, 4819.20.10 and 4819.20.90) is substituted, and an existing exempt-item window that ran 1 July 2025 to 30 June 2026 is rolled forward to 1 July 2026 to 30 June 2027. Pneumatic tyres for aircraft (HS 4011.30.00) and turbo-jets, turbo-propellers and other gas turbines (Heading 84.11) are added to an existing exempt item. A new item 36 exempts a supply of locally manufactured garments made from locally grown cotton, from 1 July 2026 to 30 June 2027.

What it means

This is routine schedule housekeeping in most of its lines, but two items need active attention rather than a passive re-read. Retail dog and cat food loses an exemption it previously had by association with a feeding-related item, so it needs to be reclassified as taxable rather than assumed exempt. The new cotton-garment exemption in item 36 is time-boxed to exactly one year, 1 July 2026 to 30 June 2027 — it is already in force and will lapse on its own unless a future Finance Act extends it, so it should not be built into pricing or systems as a permanent rule.