Interactive
Colombia – Colombia brings in new rules for Online Gaming and Horse Racing
By Phil - 2 November 2015
The Head of The Colombian Gaming Control Board (Coljuegos) has announced a major crackdown on online gaming and emphasised the benefits new rules of the local horse race will have on the industry.
The Colombian Gaming Control Board has also announced plans to block offshore gaming sites offering their services to locals. The new rules follow the largest crackdown in Colombian history on the land based sector with the board announcing that is has broken the record when it comes to the confiscation of illegal gaming equipment and machinery. According to the head of the board Cristina Arango, the board has so far confiscated 2,512 pieces of gaming equipment in total and imposed fines of US$13,600,000m so far this year.
The board plans to block sites via local police agencies in what could herald one of the strictest polices again online gaming in the entire region. “We have identified around 200 sites and the idea is to control them via a program in conjunction with the Ministry of Technology and Information and the Cyber Crimes Police. With them we are setting up a similar scheme to the struggle against child pornography in order to block these gambling pages on football, poker and some online lotteries,” Cristina Arango said.
She also went onto to outline the reason for the recent tax break for the horse racing industry and how it compared favourably on the tax rate for other popular games in the region such as Baloto – a lottery which runs twice a week and Super Astro – a lottery type game based around the signs of the zodiac.
The Colombian Gaming Control Board is aiming to provide a new impetus to the industry by cutting taxes and extending licences. Amendments to Colombia’s horse racing laws will cut taxes to just one per cent from five per cent on gross sales, extend licences for ten years and give local municipalities more say over the industry. “This rate is lower than Baloto which stands at 32 per cent and compared to sports betting which stands at 24 percent and Super Astro which pays 10 per cent. It’s a significantly lower rate as what we are trying to encourage is this type of business which involves large investments with coordination between horse breeders horse track operates, jockeys and track staff,” she said.
In its heyday the horse racing industry employed over 40 thousand people in Colombia but has been sharp decline with a total of eleven tracks closing over recent years and there are now only a handful of thoroughbred breeders left.
Meanwhile new rules for online gaming have been on the horizon for some time. In the past Coljuegos has been strongly protective of its monopoly over gaming and Colombian gaming law grants the board the right to offer online games on an exclusive basis. It is estimated that if online games were operated by the federal government then it could generate another $19bn pesos for the Colombian health sector in the first year.
