COMCEC — Economic & Commercial Cooperation

COMCEC is the OIC's standing committee for economic and commercial cooperation, working to expand trade among member states and, in the long term, to build an Islamic Common Market.

At a glance

Established in 1984 and permanently chaired by the President of Turkey, COMCEC is the principal forum in which the OIC pursues economic integration, supported by a coordination office in Ankara. Its work centres on raising the share of trade that member states conduct with one another — historically a modest fraction of their total commerce — through preferential trade arrangements, cooperation in transport, tourism, agriculture and finance, and the long-discussed aspiration of an Islamic Common Market.

The committee sets targets for intra-OIC trade, runs working groups and a project-funding mechanism, and coordinates the negotiation of a trade-preference system among members. Its analyses draw heavily on the data compiled by SESRIC, and its agenda overlaps with independent economic groupings such as the D-8 and the ECO.

COMCEC's ambitions illustrate both the promise and the difficulty of Muslim-world economic integration: a vast combined market and shared principles on one hand, and on the other the barriers of distance, competition and differing economic structures.

Related in Chronicle

Curated reference on Islamic belief and thought. On matters where traditions differ, positions are attributed rather than adjudicated; verify points of doctrine with qualified scholars.