The general objective of the support programme was to contribute to sustainable economic development and poverty reduction in the Comoros, through the project "Accession of Comoros to the WTO and Implementation of the Regional EPA”.

Two-fold purposes: Compliance of Comorian law and practice with trade commitments resulting from its accession to the WTO; and Development of measures to integrate the provisions of the regional EPA into the law and practice of the Comoros.

Three-fold outputs:

1. The law and practice of the Comoros to commercial commitments resulting from accession to the WTO is brought into conformity;
2. The texts on legislative and regulatory reforms are drafted;
3. Development of measures to incorporate the provisions of the regional EPA into the law and practice of the Comoros to ensure compliance with the EPA.

Intervention areas:

• Accession to WTO;
• Compliance with the Trade Facilitation Agreement;
• Reinforcing the Rules of Law relative to trade;
• Legislative and regulatory reforms;
• Customs matters, tariffs schedules updated;
• EPA implementation;
• Capacity building.

Purpose 1: The law and practice of the Comoros to commercial commitments resulting from accession to the WTO is brought into conformity.

• Review of texts relating to legislative and regulatory reforms, and provision of advice undertaken;
• Review of the Legislative Action Plan (WT / ACC / COM / 9 / Rev.3) undertaken;
• Updating the Action Plan to ensure compliance of national laws with WTO; agreements (WT / ACC / COM / 23 / Rev.1) undertaken;
• Revision of a legislative plan for the review of the Customs Code and its implementation; in particular, advice on the implementation of rules relating to customs evaluation carried out;
• Training workshop successfully carried out;
• Training materials developed and shared.

Purpose 2: Development of measures to integrate the provisions of the regional EPA into the law and practice of the Comoros

• State of play of the implementation of the EPA in the Comoros reviewed;
• Action plan for the implementation of the interim EPA prepared;
• Customs duty and tax-free regime reviewed;
• Transposition of Comoros tariff commitments from the HS 2012 version to the HS 2017 version carried out;
• Promotion of the gradual transition from customs to internal taxation carried out;
• A report on "Setting up a domestic tax system: the tax transition program" prepared;
• A note evaluating the tariff and regulatory adjustment measures prompted by the EPA on the flagship sectors of the Union of the Comoros, such as vanilla, ylang-ylang and cloves produced;