Rabat - Moroccan Industry Minister Moulay Hafid Elalamy told Reuters in an interview that Morocco expects auto industry exports to reach MAD 100 billion ($10.2 billion) per year by 2020.
Rabat – Moroccan Industry Minister Moulay Hafid Elalamy told Reuters in an interview that Morocco expects auto industry exports to reach MAD 100 billion ($10.2 billion) per year by 2020.
The increase in auto industry exports is expected as a result of recent investments, such as the $630 million PSA Peugeot Citroen factory, planned to be operational in 2019.
The leading French carmaker’s factory, which is expected to produce 200,000 cars and 200,000 motorbikes a year, “will lift the overall industrial component of gross domestic product (GDP) to 20 percent,” Elalamy told Reuters, adding that “the plant will mean others may come to produce too.”
“It will go even farther. We will exceed the 100 billion dirhams only in auto exports by 2020,” the Minister said.
“And it is not excluded that Morocco will attract other car and truck makers in the near future and could double these figures,” he added.
Morocco’s automotive sector has witnessed a boom over the last decade, and has become Africa’s second leading automaker and first in North Africa.
On the sidelines of the signing ceremony of the agreement to set up the factory last June, the Chairman of the managing board of the French carmaker Carlos Antunes Tavares said, “PSA Peugeot Citroen aims to bring its sales of cars in the region of Africa and the Middle East to one million in 2025.”
According to Reuters, “Morocco’s auto industry has already surpassed traditional Moroccan exports such as agriculture and phosphates.”
“At the end of September, total exports rose 6.2 percent from a year earlier to 160.07 billion dirhams, including 35 billion dirhams of auto exports against 34 billion for phosphate sales and 31 billion of agricultural products,” the same source added.
According to the Minister’s earlier statements, PSA Peugeot Citroen’s new plant will generate 4,500 direct jobs and 20,000 indirect, and will also house a research and development center employing 1,500 engineers and technicians.
With a remarkable increase of investors in auto sector, insightful policies, and its strategic geographic location near Europe, the Middle East, and sub-Saharan Africa, Morocco is paving its way steadily to become Africa’s leading auto manufacturer.
