Euro-Mediterranean agreement network

The Mediterranean countries have gradually joined the Pan-European free trade network. The countries have formed a new extended zone for cumulation of origin, called the Euro-Mediterranean cumulation zone.

The Pan-European free trade network has expanded to become the Euro-Mediterranean cumulation zone

In addition to the EU Member States, the Pan-European free trade network also includes Iceland, Norway, Switzerland, Liechtenstein and Turkey. This cumulation zone has expanded to include the Mediterranean countries as well as the Faroe Islands. The Mediterranean countries within the zone are Algeria, Egypt, Israel, Jordania, Lebanon, the West Bank and Gaza, Morocco, Syria and Tunisia. The expansion has resulted in groups of countries within which extended cumulation can be applied. The West Balkan countries as well as Moldova and Georgia have already partially joined this agreement network. The agreement network is gradually moving towards a single set of rules of origin (convention) instead of the rules of origin within the separate free trade agreements.

 What is cumulation?

Cumulation means that the entire manufacture of a product does not need to take place within the territory of one contracting party, e.g. in the EU, as the rules of origin require. Instead, the product can acquire origin even when raw materials originating in another contracting party, e.g. Switzerland, are used in the manufacture of the product. For example, the manufacture of clothes is often subject to the rule of origin “manufacture from yarn”. If the manufacture in the EU does not begin from yarn, but a fabric originating in Switzerland is used, cumulation is applied to the Swiss fabric, and the product can be considered as originating product.