Rabat – Despite the unstable international situation, Morocco’s economic growth is expected to reach 4.5% in 2023, up from 1.5% this year.
While presenting the budget for this year and the 2023-2025 period, Nadia Fettah, Minister of Economy and Finance took the time to explain these forecasts to the Committee on Finance and Economic Development in the House of Representatives on July 28 in Rabat.
She emphasized that this promising economic growth forecast is based on various positive assumptions. These include a grain harvest of 75 million quintals in 2023, a drop in butane gas prices to $700 per ton, a fall in oil prices to $93 per barrel, and, as a result, a restoration of the inflation rate to 2%.
The minister warned, however, that if the chances for a global economic recovery in 2023 worsened, particularly in the European Union, these projections were likely to be revised downward.
Possible reasons that could impede economic recovery include the consequences of the Ukraine war and its implications on commodity prices and global production and supply networks, as well as tighter monetary measures to curb inflationary pressures
Meanwhile, the ministry aims to reduce the budget deficit to 4.5% of annual GDP in 2023 and 3.5% in 2025, the Moroccan Economy Minister added, predicting that achieving these goals would necessitate a series of reforms and actions that will necessitate the mobilization of extra resources.
Read also: World Bank Forecasts 4.3% Rebound for Morocco’s GDP in 2023
The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) similarly predicts that Morocco’s GDP growth would be 1.2% in 2022 before reaching 3% the following year.
As agriculture recovers and growth rates revert to pre-pandemic levels, the Moroccan economy is expected to rebound well next year, according to the EBRD report.
According to Morocco’s central bank, Bank Al-Maghrib (BAM), the agricultural value is set to rise by 17%, amounting to a 4.6% growth in 2023, assuming a 75 million quintal average crop.
