Tunisia is seeking to adopt new laws regulating maritime professions

Tunisia is seeking to adopt new laws maritime regulating professions, freight activity and new challenges that the shipping industry is witnessing.
This was the focus of the National Conference of the Maritime Trades and freight professionals which was held on Tuesday in Tunis. The event is organized by the Ministry of Transport with the assistance of the Tunisian Union of Industry, Commerce and Handicrafts. Opening the conference Mr. Abdurrahman Zouari, Minister of Transport, said that the number of Tunisian companies active in this area amounted to 500 companies against 150 companies in 1995. The 2008 Act of maritime trades and freight aims at encouraging the consolidation and modernization of working methods in preparation for the liberalization of services, said the minister.
The Minister also said that this law is part of the reforms the shipping industry has known, including doubling the contribution by the national trade to double it from 9% in 2009 to 18% in 2014.Mr. Zouari reiterated Tunisia’s adherence to maritime highways project, following the adoption of the pilot project that Tunisia’s submitted to the European Union on a total of 12 projects in the Mediterranean. This project which is based on two axes Rades-Marseille and Rades-Genoa, aims at the integration of transport nodes, encouraging the use of rail and modern technology, in addition to providing services quality at the lowest cost and less delay. He also highlighted the challenge of Tunisia on the development of logistics services through the adoption of a coherent strategy in this sector to help create 35,000 jobs and to boost the GDP by 5% . The Minister also stressed the necessity to take advantage of training opportunities that the Institute for training in maritime professions offers. During the conference, several papers discussed “the use of modern technologies in the management of cargo units and monitoring” and “transport and customs measures”.