27 August 2021

NEW RULES OF ORIGIN IN THE PEM AREA

On 25 August, the European Commission announced that as of 1 September 2021, new transitional rules of origin will become applicable within the pan-Euro-Mediterranean (PEM) area, between the EU and Switzerland, Norway, Iceland, Albania, Jordan and Faeroe Islands. The new rules will apply alongside those of the Regional Convention on pan-Euro-Mediterranean preferential rules of origin (PEM Convention), pending its review, which is currently under way. The application of the new rules will be optional for businesses. The European Commission also published a Guidance on Transitional PEM Rules of Origin which clarifies how the PEM Convention, and the new transitional sets of rules will apply in parallel.

This is part of a package of amendments to 21 origin protocols within the PEM area, where the EU and 20 trading partners update, on a bilateral basis, their free trade agreement by modernising the rules of origin, until the review of the PEM Convention is finalised. The process of adoption of the amendments to the origin protocols with all the other partners (North Macedonia, Serbia, Montenegro, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Republic of Moldova, Georgia, Ukraine, Palestine, Lebanon, Turkey and Egypt) is ongoing and in different stages of progress. Information on which countries apply the new transitional rules will be made public and updated regularly by the Commission.

Source and more information: European Commission