New roadmap to boost business

The Head of Government, Aziz Akhannouch, took part, on Monday, in the monthly session dedicated to General Policy at the House of Representatives. An opportunity for him to take stock of the government’s investment policy, which remains one of the weak links in the national economy. It is clear that the return on investment remains limited compared to the efforts made by the Kingdom. Although Morocco invests 30% of its GDP (a rate above the international average), the impact in terms of growth is modest. The State remains the main investor in the economy, monopolizing two-thirds of overall investment. Indeed, the government has set itself the objective of “reversing the current distribution of the investment effort, so that private investment is at par with public investment by 2026. or the need to push the private sector to take more initiatives.The government has identified the problem: the business climate is not yet sufficiently attractive.
In front of the deputies, Aziz Akhannouch expressed the will of the Executive to further improve the business climate, by considering drawing up a new roadmap by 2026. Akhannouch promised a new generation of reforms which revolve around three main objectives, namely the simplification of administrative procedures, the improvement of access to land and public procurement, and the facilitation of access to financing.

This new roadmap is seen as a complement to the Investment Charter which was voted by the two Chambers of Parliament. The Head of Government stressed the need for the full and complete implementation of the new charter, the purpose of which is to encourage exports and to advance in the industrialization project by import substitution. The Charter, it should be remembered, offers sectoral and regional bonuses to companies in order to encourage them to invest.

To ensure that the charter gives the expected effects, the regional investment centers will be placed under the direct authority of the Head of Government, indicated Aziz Akhannouch, specifying that the prefects and the walis will have the competence to revise the decisions. regional centers in the event of refusal of the files. At the same time, the Executive intends to continue simplifying procedures, 22 of which have been simplified so far. This has led to an average reduction of 45% in the number of documents required from investors. As a reminder, the subsidies granted to the projects can go up to 30% of the total amount.

At the same time, the Executive is counting on the added value of the Mohammed VI Fund for Investment, endowed with an envelope of 45 billion dirhams, including 15 billion provided by the State. The operationalization of the fund is already designed, knowing that its areas of intervention have been identified.

Regarding industrial investment, Aziz Akhannouch returned to his government’s results, which he considers positive. He welcomed the fact that the Executive has increased the amount of public investment to a record level (300 billion dirhams). In this regard, he gave an overview of the results of the Investment Commission which, he said, has signed 84 investment agreements with a total volume of 64 billion dirhams. An amount that should generate 10,250 direct jobs and 33,000 indirect jobs.

Aziz Akhannouch also welcomed the achievements of the automotive and aeronautical industry, recalling that Morocco has passed the milestone of 100 billion dirhams of car exports in 2022. A performance which exceeds by 35% that recorded the year former. Ditto for exports of aeronautical parts which increased by 40% at the end of November 2022 compared to the same period the previous year.

This performance is part of a palpable dynamism of industrial exports, the volume of which reached a record level, according to the Head of Government. In fact, they reached around 339 billion dirhams, an increase of 35%.

The Head of Government expressed Morocco’s desire to develop these two industries in the years to come to make the Kingdom a “competitive platform at the global level”. This is why the Executive has set three objectives, namely the improvement of the rate of local integration, the association of Moroccan capital in industrial projects and decarbonization.

The Executive has similar ambitions for other sectors such as outsourcing and wants to capitalize on current achievements. This sector, considered promising, contributes to the creation of 120,000 job opportunities, and contributes up to 14 billion dirhams of the value of exports. In addition, the pharmaceutical industry is also included in the list of priority sectors for the government.