Morocco's Presence in Africa

Morocco has placed its home continent (Africa) at the top of its development priorities.

Under the guidance of His Majesty the King, Morocco adopts a strategic diplomatic approach with the main objective to develop partnership models with various African countries based on the concepts of co-development, South-South solidarity, and a strong social and human dimension.

Why Africa?

• Africa should no longer be seen as the continent of poverty, underdevelopment and conflicts, rather it is considered to be a continent of opportunities due to its investment and trade potentials;
• Time to break down the stereotypes according to which the African market would be riskier than the others, and to strengthen the potential for inter-continental and intra-continental cooperation;
• Africa is expected to keep an annual average growth above 4.3%;
• The emergence of a middle class expected to spend about 2 trillion USD in 2025;
• Africa has hug natural and agriculture resources: 60% of the world’s uncultivated arable land and 30% of the global reserve of minerals, 10% of the world’s natural gas;
• Annual growth of investments has reached 11% and manufacturing industries to attain 930 billion USD;
• The impressive growth rate and the growing demand in Africa have made it a competition field between the numerous powers seeking to gain a foothold in this continent.
• Massive presence of important new partners such as China (trade turn-over 220 billion USD and 100 billion USD of investment), India (trade turn-over 62 billion USD and 20 billion USD of investment), japan (trade turn-over 24 billion USD and 20 billion USD of investment);

Moroccan economy’s presence in Africa:

Thanks to this Royal Vision, Morocco is today the 1^st investor in West Africa and the 2^nd investor at the continental level.

Morocco enjoys a substantial multiform presence in Africa in vital sectors such as banking, insurance, energy, telecommunications, etc:

• Moroccan banks – Attijariwafa bank (AWB), Banque Centrale Populaire (BCP) and BMCE Bank of Africa (BBoA) – are now present in 25 African countries mainly Senegal, Côte d’Ivoire, Mali and Togo;
• “Maroc Telecom” a global telecommunications operator in Morocco, has grown internationally and is now present in eleven countries in Africa;
• The Moroccan OCP group (Office Chérifien des Phosphates), 95% owned by the State, is one of the main exporters of crude phosphate, phosphoric acid and phosphate fertilizers in the world. The OCP group has set up OCP Africa which has created 12 subsidiaries in the African continent, notably in Ethiopia, Nigeria, Côte d’Ivoire, Burkina Faso, Senegal, Cameroon, Benin, Kenya, Tanzania, Rwanda, Ghana and in Zambia;
• Royal Air Maroc (RAM), established in 1957, is one of the few heavyweight African companies in the airline sector with Ethiopian Airlines. RAM has a fleet of around 60 aircraft that currently serve more than 32 destinations on the African continent.

In addition, Morocco undertakes various partnerships and capacity development actions in priority areas such as water, sanitation, customs, airports management, etc.

Morocco focuses on positioning its self as both a hub and foothold for international companies with an interest in expanding across the African continent.

Casablanca Financial City has become a financial hub for the French-speaking African market. Many of the major multinational manufacturers that have set up production units in Morocco have extended their activities to the African markets.