A sub-regional seminar for the Central African Economic and Monetary Community (CEMAC) and its Member administrations was conducted by the WCO from 22 to 26 July 2019 in Libreville, Gabon, in the context of the EU-WCO Programme for Harmonized System in Africa. It brought together the six CEMAC Members – Cameroun, Central African Republic, Chad, the Republic of the Congo, Equatorial Guinea and Gabon, as well as a representative of the CEMAC Secretariat and an expert of the Economic Community of Central African States (ECCAS), given the overlapping membership of the two communities and their partnership relations.
Participants of the seminar reviewed the current situation with regard to the implementation of the HS by the sub-region, paying special attention to the application of the current version of the HS in the CEMAC countries. The main topic of the event was establishing an inclusive co-operation framework to streamline the process of migration of the Community Common External Tariff to new versions of the HS and timely implementation of HS 2022 by the CEMAC, the ECCAS and its Members.
A number of specific technical issues related to the implementation of the HS were discussed during the seminar and recommendations seeking to achieve sustained improvement in that area were agree upon by the two Communities and their Members. Concrete steps to harmonize HS-related work at the sub-regional level and at the level of national administrations were planned.