Zambia VAT rate
Standard (prescribed) rate of Value Added Tax charged on taxable supplies and taxable importations under section 9 of the Value Added Tax Act, Chapter 331 of the Laws of Zambia, administered by the Zambia Revenue Authority. Section 9(3) fixes the prescribed rate at 17.5 per centum 'unless the Minister, by statutory order, determines a lower rate' — the operative 16% is such a ministerial order.
| Current value | 16 percent |
|---|---|
| In force from | 2008-04-01 |
| Official source | Zambia Revenue Authority — Practice Notes 2008 (Domestic Taxes Division), §5.6: 'STATUTORY INSTRUMENT NUMBER 14 OF 2008 — This amendment reduces the tax rate from seventeen and half per centum to sixteen per centum', and §5.1: SI No. 14 of 2008 'comes into effect on 1st April 2008'; current rate restated on the ZRA Tax Information page ('supplies that attract VAT at the prescribed standard rate 16%') |
| Last verified | 2026-07-24 |
| Verification | primary — No verification limitation recorded — read from the official source cited. |
| Provenance | source fingerprint |
What this value means
Confirmed at 16% — the brief was right. TRAP: the statute itself still reads 17.5%. VAT Act Cap 331 s.9(3) says 'The prescribed rate of tax shall be seventeen and a half per centum, unless the Minister, by statutory order, determines a lower rate'; the 16% rate lives in Statutory Instrument No. 14 of 2008 made under that power, not in the Act. Anyone reading the consolidated Act text published by the National Assembly (https://www.parliament.gov.zm/sites/default/files/documents/acts/Value%20Added%20Tax%20Act.pdf — the Ministry of Legal Affairs consolidation as at 31 Dec 1996, last noted amendment S.I. No. 11 of 1997) will get 17.5% and be wrong. Other rates: zero-rated supplies at 0% (exports and certain listed supplies, s.9(4) and the Zero-Rating Order) and exempt supplies which carry no VAT and no input credit (Exemption Order). Rate unchanged by the 2026 budget cycle: the Value Added Tax (Amendment) Acts of 2025 (effective 1 Jan 2026) changed administration, not the rate. ACCESS NOTE: zra.org.zm presents an incomplete TLS chain — WebFetch fails with 'unable to verify the first certificate'; the host is reachable with a relaxed-chain HTTP client and the WordPress REST API at /index.php?rest_route=/wp/v2/media is a reliable way to enumerate ZRA PDFs. The primary SI No. 14 of 2008 text itself is not published online in any government repository found; the ZRA Practice Note is the closest official record of it.
Get it programmatically
curl https://afriref.dev/v1/zm/vat
# $0.001 per call — x402 on Base (USDC). No key, no signup.
# History: curl https://afriref.dev/v1/zm/vat/history?from=2020-01-01
# Provenance: curl https://afriref.dev/provenance/zm/vatOther Zambia series: policy interest rate · minimum wage · public holidays · inflation rate (CPI) · corporate tax rate · income tax rates