New Laws to Regulate Remote Work and Digital Platforms in Tunisia
On the sidelines of the 8th Arab Conference on Pensions and Social Insurance, held in Tunis from July 20 to 22, 2026, the Minister of Social Affairs, Issam Lahmar, announced on Monday that two draft laws, one on remote work in the private sector and the other on the economy of digital platforms, are nearly finalized.
A Legal Framework for New Forms of Employment
In concrete terms, each text covers a distinct aspect: remote work on one hand, and digital platforms on the other, but with the same goal: to provide legal coverage for forms of employment that previously lacked it, while boosting the economic activity they generate and extending social protection to the workers they employ.
According to the minister, measuring the success of this reform solely by the number of new insured individuals would be insufficient; it is also necessary for the system to convince citizens and have a tangible impact on their daily lives. The approach will be progressive: the most vulnerable populations will be taken care of first, before coverage is gradually expanded to other categories of workers, including those in the informal sector and new forms of activity, in parallel with a tightening of contribution collection and anti-fraud controls.
A Change in Philosophy
This is not, the minister emphasizes, simply a technical expansion of an existing system, but a change in philosophy: social protection designed from the perspective of workers' rights, rather than being based on a model of employment that has become too narrow in the face of the diversity of current economic activities.
A Framework that Could Also Benefit Entrepreneurs
These two texts could, therefore, remove a obstacle for companies and digital platforms operating in Tunisia: the lack of a clear legal framework has long hindered entrepreneurs who wanted to formalize business models based on remote work or digital intermediation.
Once adopted, these texts would offer more legal security to startups in the sector; delivery, freelancing, on-demand services, and could facilitate both the launch of new activities and the arrival of investors. However, everything will depend on the precise content of the two draft laws, which have not yet been published.
