Morocco’s 2025-2027 Foreign Trade Roadmap to Generate 76,000 Jobs

Doha – The Moroccan government has unveiled an ambitious foreign trade roadmap for 2025-2027, aiming to boost national exports and create thousands of jobs. Head of Government Aziz Akhannouch chaired a meeting in Rabat on Tuesday to review this strategic plan presented by Secretary of State for Foreign Trade, Omar Hejira.

The roadmap centers around three key strategic objectives: creating 76,000 new jobs, expanding the export base by establishing 400 new export companies annually, and generating an additional MAD 84 billion (approximately $8.4 billion) in export revenues.

During the meeting, Akhannouch stated that the government has worked to strengthen foreign trade and promote national exports as drivers of growth and development, in accordance with royal directives.

He pointed out the importance of supporting and encouraging Moroccan small and medium enterprises interested in entering the export sector.

The 2025-2027 foreign trade roadmap encompasses six reform projects, including accelerating the digitalization of foreign trade, creating regional offices to support this digitalization, and promoting exports from the handicraft and social and solidarity economy sectors.

This new strategy comes after months of preparation. In January, Hejira revealed that the development of this action plan involved an extensive regional tour that identified numerous export barriers and collected 524 proposals, with 80% coming from Morocco’s regions and 20% from the ministry.

These proposals, backed by 1,200 elected officials and economic operators, aim to improve competitiveness, simplify procedures, support SMEs, diversify export markets, and balance the export landscape currently dominated by just three regions accounting for 85% of exports.

The strategy also included the creation of 12 regional offices dedicated to foreign trade development across Morocco by the end of January, designed to capitalize on underexploited potential.

A chatbot for foreign trade will also be launched to facilitate interaction between stakeholders and the ministry regarding their expectations.

The plan tackles serious trade imbalances. In 2023, Moroccan exports reached MAD 430 billion ($43 billion), compared to MAD 716 billion ($71.6 billion) in imports, resulting in a substantial trade deficit of MAD 286 billion ($28.6 billion).

A ministerial study updated in 2023 identified a potential MAD 120 billion ($12 billion) in untapped export opportunities, with 10% related to African markets.

Boosting African trade

According to Hejira, the new 2025-2027 strategy will include announcements covering all of Morocco’s foreign markets, including countries with which Morocco has signed free trade agreements (USA, Turkey, European Union, AfCFTA, Mercosur).

Several corrective measures will soon be announced to strengthen export shares to countries where Morocco’s trade deficit is significant.

Currently, 92% of Moroccan exports are concentrated in six key sectors: automotive (34.4%), agriculture and food industries (19.3%), phosphates and derivatives (17.8%), leather products (10.7%), aviation (5.3%), and electronics (4.3%).

Despite Morocco’s export growth in recent years, exports to Africa have increased at a slower pace compared to other regions. According to data from the Office des Changes, over the past decade (2015-2024), exports to Africa rose by 47.82% to MAD 31.62 billion ($3.16 billion).

During the same period, exports increased by nearly 84% to Asia, more than doubled to America and Europe, and increased nearly fivefold to Australia.

To address this issue, a new complementary public export insurance scheme will be launched in early June.

Developed in consultation with all public and private stakeholders in the export insurance ecosystem, this program will initially cover commercial and political risks for public and private buyers from 15 strategic African countries.

The new foreign trade roadmap represents a comprehensive approach to strengthening Morocco’s export position globally, with particular attention to untapped potential in African markets.