FOM Newsletter February 2002
FOM Newsletter February 2002 Index
Morocco Week in Review February 23, 2002 

The United Nations Development Program (UNDP) has joined the Moroccan agriculture ministry, health ministry and the BMCE foundation in a drive to promote schools in rural areas. Under agreements signed on Wednesday, the UNDP will cooperate with the Moroccan government and the BMCE foundation to increase the number of schools in the countryside. The BMCE foundation is conducting an important program of rural schools in various regions. A total of 50 schools have already been built and more than 100 ones will be operational by 2002-2003 academic year. The initiative is supported by the agriculture ministry which will bring its know how and technical assistance to the project by raising people's awareness on the usefulness of sending children to schools, holding agricultural popularization actions for children and adults and identifying priority sites for rural schools. The UNDP, for its part, will bring its support and expertise through various programs meant to fight poverty and develop rural communities. The UNDP will also set forth an approach based on integrated rural development by promoting the involvement of communities and lasting agriculture.

Meanwhile, the health ministry will take action to improve health conditions in the schools through an education and awareness program for the rural schools pupils and by conducting medical visits. The Moroccan government has pledged to generalize schooling among children aged between 6 and 15 and to take moves to fight illiteracy. For the UNDP resident-representative in Morocco, Bouna Semou Diouf, said the rural community schools will be serving as centers of local development, as schools staff will be recruited from local inhabitants, and integrated programs of training and community development will be set in motion both for teenagers and adults living in these areas.

LONDON, Feb 20 - In its annual report on the Kingdom of Morocco, Moody's Investors Service says its Ba1 long-term foreign currency country ceiling for bonds and notes reflects a decade of structural reforms. The report also indicates that the December 2001 change in outlook on the foreign currency ceiling from stable to negative and the issuance of a local Ba1currency rating reflect the kingdom's wide budget deficit emanating from an increasing wage bill, an erosion of the tax base and a further reduction in external tariffs given Morocco's Free Trade Agreement with the EU. "Morocco's creditworthiness is also constrained by its vulnerability to climatic uncertainties and sluggish non-agricultural GDP growth," says Moody's Vice President/Senior Analyst Sara Bertin-Levecq, author of the report. "In a context of slowing growth, partly induced by the global downturn, and upcoming election in October 2002, Morocco's already wide fiscal deficit is likely to deteriorate further." The rating agency also reports that the level of external debt has been trending down due to the active debt management strategy pursued by the government. "Nonetheless, part of the foreign currency debt reduction has been offset by an increase in domestic debt, causing the total public debt levels to remain high," says Bertin-Levecq. Financing the deficits with privatization receipts will be difficult given weak equity markets worldwide, says the rating agency. As a result, the government will be forced to rely increasingly on domestic debt financing and the debt ratios are likely to increase further. "The government remains committed to privatization and a broad range of reforms in the area of social policies, education and governance," says Bertin-Levecq. "These reforms have not yet translated into higher growth rates needed to generate sufficient employment to absorb new entrants on the labor market." Moody's report, "Kingdom of Morocco: Global Credit Research," is a yearly update to the markets and is not a formal action to alter the credit rating of the issuer.

(London Capital Markets +44-20-7542 7658 fax +44-020-7542 5285, denise.manning@reuters.com))

RABAT, Feb 23 (Reuters) - Dry weather so far this year means that Moroccans paid low prices for the sheep and goats they have been buying to mark Saturday's Muslim Eid al-Adha feast, a senior Moroccan agriculture ministry official said. He said Moroccans bought some 5.1 million sheep and goats this year, generating a turnover of 7.8 billion dirhams ($670 million). "Dry weather, which has prevailed in February and January, had kept mutton prices low this year, around the same level as in 2001," the official said late on Friday. Local farmers fear the 2002 season will be a third straight dry year after two years which have seen a major shortfall in cereals and livestock feed productions. Prices of livestock in Morocco fall in dry seasons as farmers expect a rise in livestock feed prices and therefore slaughter their livestock earlier.  Agriculture contributes for up to 20 percent of the country's Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and employs nearly half its workforce. ($1=11.644 Moroccan dirhams)

(Rabat newsroom, +212-37 720065 fax +212-37 722499, rabat.newsroom@reuters.com)

Despite several years of drought, Morocco has managed to score positive economic results between 1998 and 2001, including the downsizing of external debt to US$14.2 billion from US$19.1 billion. The statement was made Wednesday by Moroccan Prime Minister, Abderrahmane Youssoufi, at a scientific meeting here. Economic growth posted an average rate of 3.8 percent between 1998 and 2001 against 2.8 percent only between 1993 and 1997, Youssoufi said. Morocco also managed to drain US$7 billion in foreign investments during this lapse of time. Two thirds of these investments are job-generating, he said. Despite the terror attacks against the USA last September 11, the year 2001 was exceptional for Morocco with a growth rate of 6.5 percent, said Youssoufi, who added thatinflation was below 1 percent of the GDP.

Thirty women will sit in the House of Representatives, lower chamber of the Moroccan parliament, Moroccan culture and communication minister, Mohamed Achaari, announced on Thursday. The decision, included as a provision in the organic law on elections, seeks to encourage women's participation and representation in the chamber, Achaari, told the press after a government council held under the chairmanship of Prime Minister Abderrahmane Youssoufi. Presently, Only two women are member of the 325-seat House of Representatives. The government council also approved a text on the drawing of new electoral rolls that will be used in the elections of next September. Under the new organic law, the 325 members of the House will be elected at the direct universal suffrage according to the list voting system, the minister said.  "The legislative vote will be operated according to proportional representation based on the strongest average survives," he said. The enforcement of compulsory vote is among the innovations of the new law.  The compulsory vote "is a strong signal of our will to reinforce the values of citizenship, the objective being to encourage participation in elections," the minister said, adding "failure to participate in elections seriously jeopardizes democracy." Electoral fraud and the use of money to buy votes will be severely reprimanded, he said.

Morocco is planning to develop its information technology (IT) sector in the near future by increasing its computer program export to five billion dollars per annum by 2005 compared with one billion dollars in 2001, reported Al-Hayat . Exports from the IT sector are estimated at $10 billion, based on the new plan and is expected to create 100,000 jobs by 2005. The Moroccan government hopes to increase its nation's Internet subscribers to three million by 2005. Local computer sales hit $500 million last year, of which 30 percent were locally assembled computers. -- (menareport.com)

Youssoufi calls Moroccan civil society associations to be an influential force.

Representatives of Moroccan Non-governmental organizations, meeting in Rabat Friday, called for the reinforcement of their institutional frame for a better action. The NGOs representatives called for an ethics charter and for a stronger involvement in social and economic issues having a direct impact on the population. In an address to the meeting closing session, Moroccan Premier, Abderrahmane Youssoufi, called on civil society associations to be an influential force regarding social issues. Social organizations, he said, should contribute to the settlement of economic, social and cultural problems and play a role backing that of the state and the political class.

RABAT, Feb. 19 - The Moroccan government announced on Tuesday that a reform project of the audio-visual media will be submitted shortly to its council before it is tabled before the parliament. Culture and communication minister, Mohamed Achaari, who made the announcement at a press conference, said the project seeks to amend the statutes governing the public TV channel TVM, the national Radio and the Moroccan news agency MAP. The three institutions will be transformed into national enterprises, Achaari said, adding the project will be submitted to the government council "in the few weeks to come."

RABAT, Feb 19 (Reuters) - Morocco's 2001 trade deficit inched down 0.6 percent to 43.4 billion dirhams ($3.7 billion) from 2000 due mainly to a rise in processed consumer goods exports and a drop in industrial equipment imports, a state body said on Tuesday. The foreign trade regulatory Office des Changes said in a report that the trade deficit in 2000 stood at 43.7 billion dirhams. Total imports at the end of 2001 rose 1.1 percent to 123.85 billion dirhams and exports rose 2.0 percent to 80.43 billion dirhams, it said in the report published on its Web site.  The cover ratio of exports to imports improved to 64.9 percent from 64.3 percent in 2000, it added.

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