The Central African Republic does not have a comprehensive framework that provides effective protection of trade secrets, but there are limited measures addressing some related issues. The country has established provisions addressing disclosure, acquisition or use of confidential information in the course of industrial or commercial activities by third parties in Art. 6 of Annex VIII of the Bangui Agreement ratified by 17 French-speaking States, including the Central African Republic since 2002.

Arts. 35 and 42 of Law No. 18.002 and Decree No. 9.042 set an obligation for passive infrastructure sharing in the Central African Republic to deliver telecom services to end users.

It is reported that the government owns 60% of Société Centrafricaine de Télécommunications (SOCATEL) stock. SOCATEL is the leading telecommunications and Internet service provider in the Central African Republic.

According to Law No. 18.002, the regulatory authorities may impose accounting separation concerning certain activities in the field of interconnection and/or access for the dominant operator (Art. 50). It is also reported that the Central African Republic imposes functional and accounting separation for operators with significant market power (SMP) in the telecommunications sector.

The CAR has not appended the World Trade Organization (WTO) Telecom Reference Paper to its schedule of commitments.

According to Art. 2 of Law No. 17-020, the Electronic Communications and Postal Regulatory Authority (ARCEP), the executive authority for the supervision and administration of services in the telecommunications sector, is independent from the government in the decision-making process.

Central Africa Republic is not a signatory of the 1996 World Trade Organization (WTO) Information Technology Agreement (ITA) nor the 2015 expansion (ITA II).

It is reported that the Government is authorised to conduct competitive bidding when the price of the project exceeds 250 million CFA francs (approx. USD 415,160) for services and above 25 Million CFA francs (approx. USD 41,516) for intellectual services.

According to Law No. 08-017 on the Public Procurement Code in CAR, when awarding a public contract or a public service delegation, preference may be given to the bid submitted by a company with its head office in the Central African Republic. Firms having their registered office in a CEMAC Member State may benefit from the above-mentioned preference rules. This margin of preference, quantified as a percentage of the amount of the bid, may in no case exceed 15% for national firms and 10% for firms having their headquarters in CEMAC countries (Art. 64).
Moreover, a contract applicant who plans to subcontract at least 30% of the total value of the contract to a company in a CEMAC member state may be granted a margin of preference not exceeding 5%, which may be added to the preference referred to in Art. 64 of this law (Art. 26). This applies to contracts for a local authority or one of its public establishments.

CAR is not a party to the World Trade Organization (WTO) Agreement on Government Procurement (GPA) nor does it have observer status.

According to the Investment Charter of 2001 in CAR, any natural or legal person, Central African or foreign, regardless of their place of residence, may undertake and freely carry out economic activities in CAR, subject to specific provisions aimed at protecting the environment, health and public hygiene. In this regard, no discrimination can take place between natural or legal persons of Central African nationality and those of foreign nationalities, subject to measures relating to all foreign nationals and the application of the same principle of equal treatment by the State of which the foreign natural or legal person is a national (Art. 9).

According to Art. 103 of the Revised Uniform Act relating to the Law of Commercial Companies and Economic Interest Groups of the Organization for the Harmonization of Business Law in Africa (OHADA) applied by the CAR, the founders of companies must be domiciled in one of the States Parties. OHADA includes 17 countries, namely Benin, Burkina Faso, Côte d'Ivoire, Guinea-Bissau, Mali, Niger, Senegal, Togo, Cameroon, Congo, Gabon, Equatorial Guinea, Central African Republic, Chad, Comoros, Guinea, and the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Japan has not adopted national legislation based on or influenced by the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law (UNCITRAL) Model Law on Electronic Commerce.