HCP: Economic growth would be 3.1% in 2018 and 2.9% in 2019

At a time when the international context remains favorable for Morocco

It will be around 3.1% at the end of 2018. The Moroccan economy will evolve at a slower pace than what was observed a year earlier. Indeed, economic growth of 4.1% recorded at the end of December would disappoint in the short term. This slowdown will continue until 2019, when the national economy is expected to improve by 2.9%. And for good reason: economic growth remains dependent on rainfall risks with a low technology and export capacity offer, which creates few skilled jobs and has little contribution to reducing social and territorial inequalities. These forecasts were announced by Ahmed Lahlimi, High Commissioner for Planning, during the presentation, Tuesday, July 10 in Casablanca, the exploratory budget 2019.

In this perspective, the HCP expects a moderate increase in the primary sector. After an increase of 13.2% in 2017, the value added of the primary sector would rise by 3.1% in 2018 before declining by 0.3% in 2019. To this end, the sector's contribution to GDP would be in 2019 compared with 0.4 point in 2018. Non-agricultural activities, for their part, are expected to continue their upward trend, going from 2.8% in 2017 to 3.1% in 2018 and 3.2% in 2019. This increase supported would be mainly driven by industrial and mining activities.

The good performance of the tertiary sector, driven by the dynamism of the tourism sector, would also help to boost the pace of the secondary sector, representing a growth of 3.1% in 2018 and 2019 against 2.7% in 2017. The HCP also indicated that domestic demand would continue to drive economic growth, up 3.5% in 2018 and 2.9% in 2019. At the same time, net external demand should again contribute negatively to growth, despite the expected improvement in global demand for Morocco. Indeed, the international context remains favorable for Morocco. An environment that Morocco should take advantage of in order to better exploit its assets and remove its management constraints and its proven and latent structural deficits. In addition, infrastructure programs and the relative recovery of industrial activities would help support gross fixed capital formation, whose volume would increase by 5.6% in 2018 compared to 0.8% in 2017. This volume would improve by 3%. , 6% in 2019. Note that the national economy would continue to experience an increase in financing needs. This need, which Morocco must cover through the use of indebtedness, will be 3.9% in 2018 and 3.6% in 2019.