Maghreb countries: Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia

The Agence de la biomédecine and the Maghreb countries have been cooperating bilaterally for almost 25 years. Cooperation is tailored to the context of each country, and responds to identified needs. Agence de la biomédecine's role in these bilateral agreements is to provide expertise and project management. Depending on the thematic focus of the agreement, working meetings are organized by Agence teams, and Agence medical experts are called in.

The Agence de la biomédecine has been working with Algeria since 2016. Indeed, the Agence de la biomédecine first supported the creation of the Agence nationale des greffes (ANG) with a consolidation of their regulatory and legal framework. The Agence de la biomédecine also supported the development of the transplant plan and the creation of a communication strategy to promote organ donation in the country. Today, we support Algeria in the development of organ procurement and transplantation through training for healthcare professionals. Every year, the Agency coordinates the administrative and operational management of training courses for healthcare professionals in French hospitals.

The Agence de la biomédecine has been collaborating with the Centre national pour la promotion de transplantation d'organes (CNPTO) in Tunisia since 1998. Today, cooperation agreements are tripartite between the Tunisian National Center for the Promotion of Organ Transplantation, the French Institute in Tunisia (French Embassy in Tunisia) and the Agence de la biomédecine. The aim of this collaboration is to support the country in the development of deceased donor procurement and transplantation through the training of healthcare professionals and the implementation of best practice rules, to develop the establishment of a tissue bank and the implementation of an information system. As part of this collaboration, the Agency makes its medical experts available to promote the exchange of best practices. It also handles the organization and administrative management of these cooperative ventures, mobilizing its legal and financial departments to sign agreements and monitor budgets. The Agency works closely with the French Embassy in Tunisia and the CNPTO.

For example, since 2024, the Agency has been working with the CNPTO to set up audits of hospital sampling coordinations in Tunisia.

After drawing up a framework reference document and training apprentice auditors from Tunisia, Agence de France experts and apprentice auditors from Tunisia carried out the first audit at Mohamed Taher Maamouri Hospital in Nabeul, Tunisia.

The first exchanges between the Agence de la biomédecine and the Kingdom of Morocco took place in 1999. The aim of this cooperation was to set up a legislative framework to develop deceased-donor transplantation, and to train transplant teams at the Casablanca and Rabat University Hospitals in living-donor and deceased-donor transplantation.

The Kingdom of Morocco does not have a regulatory agency for organ, tissue and cell procurement and transplantation. However, the Conseil Consultatif de Transplantation d'Organes Humaines (CCTOH) advises the Ministry of Health on issues relating to the removal, transplantation, preservation and transport of human organs and tissues, and draws up and proposes to the Ministry rules of good practice. Relations between the Agence de la biomédecine and Morocco have been ongoing for almost 20 years, notably through Morocco's participation in the organization of the Colloque France-Maghreb sur la transplantation (CFM), hosted by Morocco in Rabat in 2005 and Fez in 2015.