Tunisia investor residence card

Tunisia has no investment threshold that buys residence. The investor route is for foreigners who actually set up and run a business: foreign employers, managers and co-managers with full powers and legal representatives of a company. For them the Ministry of Vocational Training and Employment issues a certificate of non-subjection to the contract visa, so no labour market test applies.

Foreign partners and shareholders who take a salaried post in the company follow a separate contract-visa checklist, which requires the company statutes and the Central Bank of Tunisia's prior approval of foreign participation in the commercial company.

For a first certificate the ministry asks for a copy of the investment declaration issued by APII, APIA or CEPEX, or else the trader's card; the commercial register extract; the company's latest CNSS salary declaration for its staff; a copy of the passport; and two TND 5 fiscal stamps.

Executives recruited by a company under Investment Law No. 2016-71 use a declaration procedure: a declaration of recruitment of a foreign executive, the filing certificate from APII, APIA or CEPEX, the tax card, the CNSS declaration (not required for newly created companies), the passport, diplomas or experience certificates and the two stamps, plus a sworn statement when the company goes beyond four foreign executives.

With the certificate, the investor applies for the residence card with: the certificate of non-subjection, a copy of the company's statutes and their publication in the Official Journal (JORT), proof of accommodation, a copy of a valid passport, four identity photos and the 'visa - residence card' form. The Ministry of the Interior names two places to file: the National Security sectors for ordinary investors, or the offices of the Agency for the Promotion of Industry (APII) and the investor support cell at the ministry in charge of development and international cooperation, which handle investors, their family members and the executives working with them. A complete file is decided within one month.

The Ministry of the Interior's guidance places the investor's family members and the executives working with the investor in the same filing channel as the investor (APII offices or the investor support cell). A spouse who will take salaried work needs a contract visa or non-subjection certificate of their own.

The Ministry of the Interior runs an investor support unit that takes requests for information or intervention on entry visas, residence cards and other administrative rules; Tunisian and foreign investors fill in a one-page form with the company's name, address, tax number and activity. The Tunisia Investment Authority (TIA) states that it facilitates residence cards, CNSS registration and customs codes for the projects it follows, in coordination with the administrations concerned.