Rabat – Moroccan Minister of Industry and Trade Riad Mezzour said in a press statement yesterday that Morocco has recovered 100% of industrial sector jobs lost due to the COVID-19 global pandemic.
While Mezzour did not explicitly say so, the statistics cited in his statement are likely to have been taken from a recent report by Morocco’s High Commission for Planning (HCP), which indicates that the number of jobs lost within the industry and crafts sectors is set at 600 000 jobs between 2019 and 2020.
According to HCP’s report, the agriculture, forestry, and fisheries sector was the hardest hit with 477 000 jobs lost.
The HCP attributed these losses to the pandemic, arguing that the economic fallout of the COVID-19 crisis has disproportionately impacted unskilled workers. In manufacturing, 67% of layoffs were unskilled workers, while nearly 74% of unskilled construction workers were laid off, according to the report.
In the meantime, it added, the shrinking of both labor force and average working hours resulted in a 53% reduction in the number of national working hours, affecting all sectors, with the industry and crafts sectors losing 63% of hours worked at the national level.
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The pandemic disproportionately affected youth employment, driving a rise of 11 points to reach 33% among 15-24 year olds.
Youth unemployment in Morocco was higher even prior to the pandemic, with youth unemployment twice as high as the national unemployment rate. The pandemic further exaggerated the trend, according to the data compiled by the HCP.
The pandemic also affected women employment in Morocco, driving unemployment rates among women to a historical low of 21% of the labor force. The number is even staggeringly low when restricted to urban areas as it reaches 18%, falling behind the worldwide average of 47%.
This trend was further made worse by the closing of schools, as women in Morocco are more likely to engage in child care and devote six times more time to house chores than men, according to the HCP.
The HCP also reports that as jobs become more scarce, women are at risk of becoming less attractive to employers.
