Rabat – Minister of Industry Ryad Mezzour reiterated today the importance of the industrial sector in Morocco, noting that it employs 1.1 million workers.
Mezzour made his remarks in a session at the House of Councillors while addressing the growing urgency of supporting small businesses in the industry sector.
The industrial sector is a fundamental pillar of the Moroccan economy, he argued, noting that it contributes massively to the country’s economic performance and is home to around 13,000 companies.
The automotive sector, one of the promising and vibrant of Morocco’s burgeoning industry, employs 260,000 workers. The textiles sector comes second with 230,000 workers.
The rest are distributed across different sectors, such as food industries, pharmaceuticals, and construction materials.
“Moroccan industry recorded a turnover of nearly MAD 850 billion, with added value reaching MAD 250 billion,” Mezzour said,
Regarding the need to support small and medium businesses, Mezzour pledged a series of initiatives to support those companies.
He notably spoke of the efforts made to allocate a portion of public procurement contracts to similar companies, adding that it is important to enable SMEs and startups in the industrial sector to develop their projects.
Read also: HCP: Morocco’s Economy Generated 82,000 Jobs in 2024
The minister also cited the role of the Moroccan Office of Industrial and Commercial Property, as well as the establishment of a comprehensive innovation system that brings together learning institutions, innovation centers, and companies to foster a culture of innovation.
In June last year, Minister of Labor Younes Sekkouri said the government was working on an ambitious new decree to bolster investment in SMEs.
“We are working on a decree that will provide an investment mechanism dedicated to SMEs, to also direct state investment aids according to the jobs, especially created by these very small businesses,” he said.
Despite these pledges and some signs of efforts on the ground, Morocco is still grappling with a high unemployment level.
The latest statistics from the country’s High Commission for Planning (HCP) indicate that the national unemployment rate rose from 13% to 13.3% last year.
The number of unemployed rose over the past year by 58,000 (4%) to reach 1.638 million, compared to 1.58 million last year.
Morocco’s economy created 82,000 jobs by the end of the fourth quarter of last year, insufficient to absorb the alarmingly increasing numbers of unemployed Moroccans.
More than half of these newly created jobs came from the industrial sector, which generated 46,00 jobs — namely 35,000 in urban areas and 11,000 in rural areas.
