Morocco’s Household Confidence Index Hits All-Time Low

Rabat – A total of 79.2% of households in Morocco say that living standards have deteriorated for them in the past 12 months, while 14.6% say they haven’t noticed much change and only 6.2% noted an improvement in their living standards.

According to a new survey from Morocco’s High Commission for Planning (HCP), Moroccan households noted an overall pessimistic view of the current living standards.

The Household Confidence Index (ICM), an index tracking the confidence of households in the economic outlook, dropped further by 6.2 points in the course of the second quarter of 2022, going from -66.8% in Q1 of 2022 to -73%, says the HCP report.

Regarding households’ expectations of living conditions for the coming 12 months, 46.8% of surveyed households said they expect living standards to deteriorate further, 40.7% expect living conditions to remain unchanged, and only 12.5% noted they expect their conditions to improve.

The ICM index comprises a number of sub-indexes, including households’ perception of the state of unemployment in the country, their perceived ability to increase savings in the upcoming 12 months, as well as their projected financial status over the same period.

When asked about their purchasing power, 78.9% of the surveyed households said this is not the right time to purchase durable goods such as cars, while only 9.8% said otherwise.

The survey results indicate that Moroccan households are overall pessimistic about every sub-indexes, with 86% of the surveyed households saying that they expect unemployment to go even higher over the next 12 months.