Foreign Trade: “New import measures in the offing for 2016”

A series of meetings between the Ministry of Trade, the Algerian Customs services, the General Tax Directorate and employers will be held shortly to pinpoint the quotas on products to be imported by Algeria as from January 2016.

Indeed, these import licenses will be granted on the basis of the identification of national needs in 2016, like vehicles where the quota will be capped at 400,000, that will be open to competition among 50 car dealers in addition to cement imports set at 3 million tons and other products, whose  quotas will be determined later.

According to the Directorate of Foreign Trade, the formula, “first come, first served”, won’t be in force any longer and the choice of potential importers, who “fight” for the lion’s share to flood the market with imports, will be made on the basis of new stringent criteria and conditions notably with regard to an update at the customs and tax services, as the latter shouldn’t have any pending debts to these services, and paid all fees and taxes without fail…

According to the same source, importers applying for a license, whose validity period will span 6 months, must have experience of 10 years and well known to the Ministry of  Trade services.

Among other conditions, license applicants must be “backed up” by the services of the Ministries of Trade, Finance, Agriculture, Industry, Customs, Tax and employers as part of a commission that will define the overall list of importers and imported products.

Priority will be given, of course, to those who have a production or investment activity in Algeria compared to other importers of products meant to be marketed only on the local market.

The most concerned are in fact those who import and export mainly, those who, in addition to their import activity, run companies whose business activity serves the national economy.