Morocco: Commercial Transactions with Rest of World Exceeded 685 Bln MAD in 2020 (Exchange Office)

21 July 2021 Printable Version

Casablanca - Morocco's commercial transactions with the rest of the world, after four uninterrupted years of growth, totaled 685.1 billion dirhams in 2020 against 775.4 billion dirhams in 2019, i.e. a drop of 11.7% due to the pandemic of the new coronavirus (Covid-19), said the Exchange Office.

However, this decrease remains lower than the one recorded in 2009 following the global financial crisis (-21.7% or -104.8 billion dirhams), said the Exchange Office in its annual report on foreign trade under the fiscal year 2020.

Merchandise imports fell by 14% in 2020 compared to 2019, while exports fell, but to a lesser extent, by -7.6%, noted the same source.

The decline in commercial transactions was, however, accompanied by an improvement in the trade balance, underlined the Exchange Office, specifying that the trade deficit stood at MAD 159.5 billion, down 22.8% compared to 2019.

Regarding the coverage rate of imports by exports, it improved to 62.2%, while the penetration rate of imports measured by the ratio between imports and domestic demand (GDP + imports-exports) lost 1.9 points to 34.3%.

The said report also shows that the export effort, measured by the ratio between exports and GDP, remains relatively stable at 24.5%. The dependency ratio, which represents the average of imports and exports, compared to GDP, fell by 1.7 points, going from 33.7% in 2019 to 32% in 2020.