A new Customs Code, designed to meet the demands of Tunisia’s increasingly open economy and to enable the country to compete as a trading nation at international level, entered into force on January 1, 2009.
The revised code includes comprehensive changes to legal and constitutional texts, as well as modifications to tax and foreign trade guidelines.

The reform centres around three key objectives, which include:

• Improving the overall competitiveness of the economy, and of small and medium-sized businesses in particular. This improvement, achieved by restructuring the existing customs systems and aligning them with international standards, aims to enable Tunisian businesses to work in a more flexible environment, similar to their foreign competitors, and, crucially, seeks to reduce import and export costs and to guarantee trading fluidity.
• Consolidating guarantees granted to economic operators dealing with customs, designed to boost confidence and improve transparency. To this end, under the new legislation, a mechanism for mediation and conciliation has been established, designed to settle disputes arising between the customs administration and the economic operators. Here, a conciliation commission “la commission de conciliation et d’expertise douanière” and a judiciary “l’institution judiciaire” have been established.
• Adapting the customs legislation with the national legal system.

The new Customs Code complies with specific guidelines contained in the Free Trade Zone agreement between Tunisia and the European Union. Consequently, tariffs and taxes are no longer levied on industrial products of European origin. However, these products will remain subject to consumption and to value added taxes, as well as to customs checks. Products emanating from other countries continue to remain subject to customs charges and taxes.

Regarding import taxes, in certain circumstances these taxes may either be exempted or reduced for certain products and raw materials. For example:

• Customs tax will be reduced by 10% for raw materials and unfinished products entering Tunisia for the manufacture of specific products and equipment.
• Raw materials and unfinished products not produced locally, yet essential for the production of medicines, will not be subject to customs tax.
• Imported products necessary for the production of computer hardware, will also not be subject to customs tax.

Tunisia’s new legislation allowing for the transparent freehold ownership of property by foreigners has pushed its unexplored property market into the spotlight.

Due to its Mediterranean climate and new laws, Tunisia could become a sought after Mediterranean destination for international property investors.

Prices are still relatively low, as the market is still emerging, and, with the tourist industry booming, investing in a property, especially in a popular location such as Djerba, Monastir and Hammamet could provide a solid rental return.

Historically, Tunisia has preferred to focus its internal efforts on reforms to introduce political pluralism and stability, and to boost and reinforce the economy.

Now, its property based economic sector is far healthier, and it has been ranked the most competitive in Africa and the Arab World in the Global Competitiveness Report from the World Economic Forum.
The International Monetary Fund also predicts solid GDP growth in Tunisia for the coming years, with predictions for the nation’s growth one of the highest in the Mediterranean region.

Tunisia is easily accessed from Europe, with daily scheduled flights from the UK. Tunisia is currently negotiating an Open Skies Agreement and there’s speculation that cheap flight operators such as Ryanair will follow - should this come to pass this will be yet another massive boost for both tourism and property market potential.

Golf tourism is another high-end area being actively developed, with five courses coming to completion across the nation’s key resorts in the coming five years.

For more information about Tunisia then tune in to the new series of Uncharted Territory on Real Estate TV (Sky channel 262 and on demand at www.realestatetv.tv) on Monday 6th October at 9.30pm as presenter Juliet Morris and buildings surveyor Graham Barton follow two property pioneers looking to buy a holiday home in the pretty Northern Tunisian town of Ghar El Melh.
To browse a range of properties in Tunisia, visit www.themovechannel.com/property/tunisia.

Tunisia has passed legislation allowing foreigners to purchase the freehold of some residential properties. The move is expected to stimulate Tunisia’s second-home market. Until the legislation allowing non-nationals to buy the freehold of certain properties was passed, Tunisia was lagging behind countries such as Morocco and Egypt in the second home stakes, according to The Mail on Sunday. The paper explains the benefits of overseas property investment in Tunisia. Five new golf courses are being constructed in Tunisia, which the country hopes will attract property investors. The courses are expected to be completed in the next five years. Property prices in Tunisia are reportedly low; apartments just 150m from the sea at the Port El Kantaoui cost from £20,000. Property investors can reach Tunisia by plane in just two and a half hours and Tunisian authorities are said to be in talks with low-cost airlines such as Ryanair. Tunisia is rich in natural beauty; the Atlas Mountains divide the country in two, lush grasslands contrast with desert, and 800 miles of coastline and pristine beaches add to the variety.

Under a new law in Tunisia, prisons are required to provide separate facilities for pregnant or nursing inmates. The new law also reduces the length of time a child can stay with their incarcerated mother from three years to one.
By Jamel Arfaoui for Magharebia in Tunis

In a unanimous decision, the Tunisian Parliament approved a new law on July 23rd requiring that separate detention facilities be created to hold pregnant or nursing prisoners. It also reduces the length of time children are allowed to stay with their incarcerated mothers from three years to one.

(Jamel Arfaoui) Social worker and prison affairs expert Sami Nasr said a new law on pregnant and nursing women in Tunisian prisons is the continuation of prison reform begun in 1989.

Justice and Human Rights Minister Bechir Tekkari told the deputies that the bill comes as part of President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali’s plan to protect the family.

This new legislation is also part of the reorganisation of prisons to bring them into conformity with child welfare provisions in the Personal Status Code, the minister said.

While they are pregnant and/or nursing, prisoners will be placed in special detention facilities “where the necessary health, psychological and social care is available for the mother and child,” the new law stated. The new facilities will be more like housing units attached to prisons, with female guards “wearing civilian uniforms”. Nine units for pregnant and lactating mothers are ready now and several more are planned.

The new legislation also reduces the amount of time children may remain with their incarcerated mothers to just one year. Under existing law, children are allowed to stay with their mothers up to the age of three.
Deputies asked why separating children from their mothers at an even younger age could be considered a positive move.

Minister Tekkari explained that it is in the best interest of the child to be removed from the prison to the care of relatives or a court-appointed guardian before the child is old enough to be physically and psychologically affected by the abnormal conditions of prisons.

Social worker and prison affairs’ expert Sami Nasr notes that the new law continues prison system reforms begun in May 1989 with the abolition of the hard labour sentence. He would have preferred another solution.
“I was hoping that all the laws related to the imprisoned mother would be replaced by giving her priority in the alternative penalties system,” he said, referring to a penal system the Tunisian government created to give the convicted a chance to spend their terms outside prison if they enrol in jobs serving the public.
The new law raised painful memories for some former prisoners, who recalled having to spend time away from their children. Ilhem, a divorced mother, was sentenced to six months in prison after a fight. She did not see her six-year-old daughter when she was incarcerated.

“I didn’t want her to see me in that condition. To her, I am like her role model,” Ilhem told Magharebia.
“Those were tough days,” she added. “It is true that I was surrounded by friends who alleviated my pains, and the female guards inside the prison understood my condition. However, nothing compensated me for missing my daughter during that time.”

Her friend Meryam added, “I think that the law will make delivery in prisons better than public hospitals, and even private hospitals, now that it was the President who demanded it!”

This content was commissioned for Magharebia.com.

Tunisia has issued a new environmental protection law that cracks heavily on air pollution from factories and vehicles. specifying financial fines and imposing the polluters to join a pollution monitoring network at their expense.

The Tunisian Parliament and Council of Advisors recently passed a law instituting mandatory measures for monitoring air quality and delineating a series of hard penalties to be imposed on all violators. Section 13 of the law states that the owner of a firm not using technological equipment “for preventing and limiting air pollution at the source” shall be fined 1,000 to 50,000 dinars. The new law requires firms operating in one of a list of air polluting activities to “[join] the National Network for Monitoring Air Quality at their own expense.
The new law punishes transgressions with fines ranging from 100 dinars to 10,000 dinars for each person whose firm exceeds the maximum limits for pollution emissions.

According to a report distributed to Parliament last spring, the transportation sector is considered one of the biggest air polluters in Tunisia. It alone accounts for 31% of national energy consumption.
A World Bank study on the costs of environmental degradation in Tunisia revealed that these costs amount to 2.1% of GDP, close to the results for developed nations; according to the World Bank report, the costs of environmental degradation in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries ranges between 1% and 1.9%, whereas the percentage in the Arab and southern Mediterranean countries ranges between 3% and 6%.

Since October 2005, the government has installed ten lighted signs displaying data from the National Network for Monitoring Air Quality. In 2004 the Ministry of Environment decided to purchase four mobile labs and to dedicate 25 fixed stations to monitoring air quality in all wilayas of the republic, particularly industrial centres and high-traffic areas.