Bureaucracy: Morocco to Reduce Paperwork Required from Investors by 45%

Rabat – Through a new reform, Morocco’s government reduced the volume of paperwork required from investors by 45%, the country’s Minister of Digital Transition and Administrative Reform Ghita Mezzour said on Monday.

Speaking during a meeting of the National Commission for the simplification of administrative procedures, Mezzour explained that the government’s efforts to digitize administrative procedures led to a 60% drop in the volume of documents required for approving an investment project.

Thanks to the digital portal “CRI invest,” the volume of paperwork was also reduced by 50% for investors filing to acquire business premises, 33% in the case of applying to build them, and 45% for those applying for operating licenses, Mezzour added.

Noting the measures taken to reduce the volume of paperwork, the minister said that the ministry adopted five techniques, including replacing some documents, deleting some unnecessary paperwork, and directly acquiring some other documents instead of asking investors to submit them.

Morocco is notorious for having a “killer administrative process,” observers note. The long and often complicated bureaucratic procedures hamper the country’s efforts to boost its business climate.

Bureaucracy in the country is standing in the way of major economic reforms, the Moroccan Institute for Policy Analysis, a think tank, argues.

The North African country has attempted to address some of the structural barriers to investments through administrative reforms, even launching a ministry tasked with the process.

In recent years, Morocco has been working to decentralize and digitize administrative processes in a bid to make them more accessible.

However, despite the continuous efforts to reform public administration, it still suffers from a number of structural deficiencies.

Research suggests that Morocco’s administration, as of 2022, suffers from a “weakness in performance and in the quality of services provided to citizens,” and “fails” to respond to citizens’ “complaints and inquiries.”

The report equally points out that Morocco’s public administration is plagued with the “excessive” use of power and influence, the “complexity” of procedures, and “long waits” for the issuance of some administrative documents.