Speaking at a virtual meeting dedicated to the presentation of the Council's opinion on Morocco's regional integration in Africa, the official said that the Royal impetus has enabled Morocco to strengthen a mutually beneficial partnership for itself and African partners.

Morocco's trade with African countries, which does not exceed 4% of its total trade, does not reflect the true potential for economic cooperation, he explained, stressing that the CESE advocates, in its opinion, for thinking about a strategy for Morocco's integration in Africa by adopting co-development as a mode of action so as to promote a mutually beneficial partnership in terms of economic development, solidarity, sharing of know-how and improving the populations' well-being of populations.

In the current context marked by the Covid-19 crisis, the establishment of integrated regional strategies in the areas of health, research and pharmaceutical industry is an appropriate response to pool efforts and resources, promote regional value chains and ultimately strengthen the resilience of African countries, Chami added.

For his part, CESE member Moncef Ziani, presented the Council's conclusions and recommendations to improve Morocco's regional integration in Africa, on the basis of a four-axes process.

The first axis aims to make Morocco's regional integration in Africa a priority while the second is meant to to strengthen the instruments of integration at the regional and continental levels, he said.

The third axis aims to operationalize and strengthen the instruments of cooperation at the bilateral level and the fourth one proposes cross-cutting actions related to the establishment of appropriate support instruments for better regional integration of Morocco in Africa, Ziani explained.

The CESE opinion, titled "Morocco's Regional Integration in Africa: For a Strategy for Sustainable Development with Africa," sheds light on Morocco's proactive cooperation policy with African countries over the last twenty years, which is oriented towards shared responsibility and solidarity.