Regulations

Employment regulations for foreigners:

To be employed in Côte d'Ivoire, non-ivorians need the following:

• A contract or an employment offer in writting which has to be endorsed by the AGEPE (Agence d'etudes et de la promotion de l'emploi)
• Within 3 months of the start of employment, the non-national has to request a work permit to the authorities

Work permits are delivered for both short-term and long term contracts and the employer has to pay annual fees for the issuance of the permit.

There are two types of working Contracts in Côte d'Ivoire. Fixed term contracts where the term is specified in advance, with the agreement of both parties, and Open ended Contracts where the term is dependant on a future element whose advent terminates the contract or where the term is not specified in advance. All contracts of more than three months must be stamped by a Work Inspector.

Legal working hours are 40 hours per week. The legal retirement age is fifty five years.

Paid annual leave is as follows: for a worker with 1 year of tenure 26.4 working days. One with a five year contract requires 27.4 working days. Workers with a contract of ten or more years require 28.4 working days.

The law in Côte d’Ivoire allows for dismissal of workers due to redundancy and employers are mandated to notify the authorities if more than nine (9) workers are dismissed.

Notice period for an employee with less than ten years of service is 4.3 weeks, while that for employees with ten or more years requires 8.7 weeks.

Taxes:

Côte d'Ivoire has a more effective tax revenue collection system than most of other sub-Saharan African countries.  It includes a wide range of taxes on personal income, capital gains, value added on economic activities, exports, and imports.

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