The Canadian Copyright Board announced today the new levies which will be added to the cost of all blank tapes and CDs as follows: Analog Audio Cassette Tapes (40 minutes or longer): 23.3 cents per tape Analog Audio Cassette Tapes (less than 40 minutes): no levy MiniDiscs, CD-Rs Audio and CD-RWs Audio : 60.8 cents per CD/disc CD-Rs and CD-RWs : 5.2 cents per CD
Manufacturers and importers are responsible for paying the levy on each unit of leviable media that they sell in Canada. Canadians will now be paying P.S.T. (in provinces that have sales tax), G.S.T. and now this much larger levy on their purchases of blank CDs and cassettes.
The levy comes into effect immediately. There are no exemptions, but there is a not yet clearly defined and not yet implemented music industry proposal to allow wholesalers to sell to zero-rated groups, such as religious groups, without having to charge them the levy.