From 19 to 27 June 2013, some twenty senior officers from Comorian Customs received Harmonized System (HS) training as part of a mission funded by the AfricanDevelopment Bank under its Institutional Capacity Building Programme. This was the third mission of its kind, following on from the previous two in Comoros. The first entailed a diagnostic of the classification work to ensure the migration of the Comorian tariff to the 2012 version of the HS and an update of the Comorian Tariff in line with the standards of the 2012 version, while the second consisted of training for senior management with a view to setting up a Tariff Management Unit.

This third and final phase of the project, representing a logical progression of the diagnostic mission carried out last year, focused on the technical side of the HS presentation. Although the time available to the mission was insufficient to address the Nomenclature in its entirety, the Sections and Chapters relating to agricultural products, textile products and high-tech products were presented in detail.

This consequently created conditions conducive to the Comorian Administration considering early application of the HS Convention which, according to the provisions laid down therein, is expected to enter into force on 1 January 2015. To that end, the Comorian Administration has enlisted the services of a Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA) specialist whose task will be to incorporate the tariff into Comorian Customs’ computer system. The specialist will travel to Moroni this month to carry out this work.

The deliverable of these different missions is the rapid implementation of the HS Convention