FOM Newsletter January 2003
Morocco Week in Review 
January 25 2003

RABAT, Jan.18 - The 5th nationwide campaign of solidarity and struggle against poverty has collected a total of 172.15 million DH (over US$ 16 Mln) in cash and commitments of in-kind donations, according to quasi-final figures announced by an audit firm.  The audit firm says the procedures to collect funds and sell badges and post stamps were appropriately respected and the provisional total amount of money (114.43 million DH or (US$ 10.7 Mln) raised from the collected funds and the selling of badges and post stamps corresponds to the amount deposited in the bank account opened by the Mohammed V solidarity foundation that holds the annual solidarity campaigns. Like in the previous campaigns, the funds and in-kind donations do not comprise state subsidies.  In-kind donations committed by various enterprises, estimated at 57.71 million DH (US$ 5.4 Mln) were not entirely received by the Foundation as at the report publication date. Compared to the 2001 campaign, cash donations have increased from 114.4 million DH (US$ 10.7 million) while in-kind donations have almost doubled (57.7 million DH or US$ 5.4 mln). In-kind donations consist in clothes, medicine, badges manufacturing, blankets and sheets, shoes, wheel chairss and other goods.  

http://www.map.co.ma/mapeng/eng.htm 

RABAT, Jan 21 (Reuters) - A sharp rise in foodstuff prices propelledMorocco's inflation rate in November to 3.0 percent, almost 50 percent above the government forecast for the whole of 2002, a state body said on Tuesday. The finance ministry revised in August the inflation forecast for 2002 from 2.5 to 2.0 percent. The Statistics Directorate said Consumer Price Index (CPI) in November rose 0.9 percent for a 3.0 percent annual rise. "The rise stemmed mainly from foodstuff prices of which the index rose 1.8 percent (in November)," the directorate said in a report.  Analysts said the rise in food prices might have been caused by strong demand at that time for Moroccan fresh products from Europe. The foodstuff index accounts for almost 40 percent of the CPI's total weighting. They doubted that the finance ministry's 2.0 percent inflation target for 2002 would be attainable. "Bank al-Maghrib (central bank) is the only establishment that can comment on inflation and it has not changed its forecast of 2.5 percent," a senior analyst said. The analyst said he expects inflation for the whole of 2002 to stand at 2.7 percent while a chief economist at a private bank forecast a 2.8 percent rate. ((Reporting by Souhail Karam; rabat.newsroom@reuters.com ; +212-37 720065, editing by Gerrard Raven))

EIB lends EUR20 million to Morocco for drinking water and environmental protection

The European Investment Bank (EIB), the European Union (EU)'s financing institution, has provided EUR20 million ($21.3 million) for schemes to upgrade the environmental operating conditions of seven drinking water treatment plants in northern and central Morocco, including the major Bou Regreg complex serving the cities of Rabat and Casablanca. This Office National de l'Eau Potable (ONEP)-promoted project will markedly improve the drinking water treatment system by eliminating environmentally hazardous wastewater discharges and ensuring more efficient use of a key natural resource for the well-being of Morocco's population and economy.  The project is expected to have a substantial environmental impact, justifying the granting of an interest subsidy financed from EU budgetary resources. This fourth EIB loan signed with ONEP brings the total amount advanced by the Bank to this utility to EUR160 million. It illustrates the importance that the EIB attaches, in common with all EU Member States, to supporting the water sector in Morocco, and complements upstream the Bank's numerous operations in favor of agricultural irrigation and sanitation projects, so covering all stages of the water cycle. - (menareport.com 

The European Commission (EC) will grant EUR500,000 ($490,425) to the Moroccan government to finance two environmental projects in the state's Moulouya Basin. The projects will promote biodiversity and water resource development. The grant will finance a study on biodiversity and pollution in the Basin region, valued at EUR169,423. The results will be used to develop a capacity increase at the Missour Waste Treatment Center as well as a regional environmental observatory. The second project will establish a Rabat-based management center for Morocco's humid areas, valued at EUR353,294. Morocco has received EUR1.1 million from the European Community in loans, EUR438 million in grants and EUR100 million in special loans from the European Investment Bank. Under the new Mediterranean Policy, the North African state underwent a structural adjustment program, receiving EUR80 million. - (menareport.com)

WASHINGTON, Jan.22 - Free trade talks between Morocco and the US started here Tuesday, under the co-chairmanship of Moroccan delegate minister of foreign affairs and cooperation, Taib Fassi Fihri, and US trade representative, Robert Zoellick,. "A free trade agreement with Morocco will expand our already strong relationship with a key economic and political partner," the U.S. Trade Representative said at a joint news conference held with Fassi Fihri. Such an accord will help promote trade opportunities for economic operators and businessmen and boost foreign investments in Morocco, he added. The US trade representative recalled the support of the two countries' heads of state to the project, describing Morocco as a strategic market, and a country engaged in large-scale reforms, under the conduct of a democratically elected government. Morocco's attachment to sealing such an accord evidences its will to set up a "strategic partnership" with a country with which it shares adherence to values of democracy and economic and political freedom, Fassi Fihri said, emphasizing Morocco's interest in diversifying its economic and commercial partners for mutually beneficial trade. The Moroccan official stressed the importance of such an accord, not only at the trade level, but also for enhancing investments necessary to job-creating growth. The second round is scheduled in Morocco next March. The two countries hope to complete an agreement by the end of this year. H.M. King Mohammed VI and U.S. President Georges Bush announced in April their intention to negotiate a free trade agreement, during H.M. the king's visit to the USA.

RABAT, Jan 21 (Reuters) - Morocco's tourism receipts in the first 11 months of 2002 up to November stood at 22 billion dirhams ($2.19 billion), down 11.3 percent from their level a year earlier, the foreign trade regulatory body said on Tuesday. The Office des Changes did not say what caused the decline, but analysts widely attribute the drop to the global downturn that hit the travel and leisure industry after the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States. Tourism receipts, a main source of hard currency for Morocco, are expected to fall by 15-20 percent for the whole of 2002 from their level of 27.8 billion dirhams in 2001, according to the finance ministry. Morocco welcomes 2.5 million foreign visitors each year and aims at quadrupling that figure by 2010. ((Reporting by Souhail Karam; rabat.newsroom@reuters.com; +212-37 720065)) ($1=10.035 Moroccan dirhams)

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Morocco's King Mohammed has announced the creation of regional investment centres in a long-awaited move aimed at attracting foreign investors. "The setting up of regional investment centres carries a wide-range of messages signalling my determination to strengthen the process of decentralisation and regionalisation, which I regard as the institutional backbone for Morocco, today as well as tomorrow," the king announced in a statement. With a population of 30 million and a workforce of 10.1 million, Morocco has an unemployment rate of 13% including some 330,000 jobless graduates, state-run Statistics Directorate's figures showed. The investment centres are expected to be operational with simplified administrative procedures in Morroco's 16 regions, including the disputed Western Sahara area. In 2001 Morroco attracted the equivalent of $3.0 billion foreign direct investment compared with an annual average of $400 million in the past decade. The king also urged the business community and government to work together to attract foreign investment and not to focus exclusively on preparations for the legislative elections due in September 2002.

http://www.corporatelocation.com/default.asp?Page=2&SID=2969 

WASHINGTON, Jan. 23 - The United States said the conclusion of free trade accords between Washington and Morocco, and the latter and the European Union (EU) should not be seen from "the angle of competition between powers."  The statement was made by Robert Zoellick, US Trade Representative, as Morocco and US negotiators started on Tuesday in Washington talks for a free-trade agreement. The US official was reacting to recent reports that French external trade Minister, Francois Loos, said there is an "incompatibility" in Morocco's conducting at the same time free trade negotiations with the USA and with the EU. "We want Morocco to have good commercial relations with Europe and with the United States and that it enjoys more options," Zoellick said. Morocco is tied to the EU by an Association Accord that provides for the entry into force of a bilateral free trade area by 2010. The North African country is also poised to be the fifth country in the world and the second in the Arab region to sign a free trade agreement with the USA. Only Canada, Mexico, Israel and Jordan have a similar accord with Washington. The US official said French authorities had assured him that Loos' statements were misinterpreted and that France sees no incompatibility between the agreement Europe is currently negotiating with Morocco and a covenant binding Rabat to the USA.

For Moroccan Delegate Minister of foreign affairs and cooperation, Taib Fassi Fihri, who leads the Moroccan negotiating team, Morocco is seeking to diversify its economic and trade partners for mutually-profitable exchangesthat go beyond mercantile considerations. Fassi Fihri said negotiating a free trade agreement with the USA should not be seen as incompatible with ongoing talks with the EU, but rather as "an intelligent complementarity". In Morocco, minister of economic affairs, general affairs and economy upgrading, Abderrazak Mossadak, said the two projected free trade agreements are not contradictory but complement each other, as the two agreements will boost Morocco's ability to attract foreign investments and contribute to increase trade exchanges.

A distant learning institute will be established in the short term, in Morocco.  The institute's name is the Institut Marocain d'Information sur les Sciences et Techniques or IMSIT will be used by teachers and trainers in the areas of information technology by taking advantage of existing technologies, such as telecommunications, satellite and Internet technologies as well as computing. The institute will get DH 150 million of funding from the government.

A symposium on Berber manuscripts in the Maghreb and Europe was held on December 9 and 10 in Aix-en-Provence, France. The event, which was part of a project called ManuMed, was financed by the Meda funds of the European Union and aimed at preserving and developing the cultural heritage of libraries in the Mediterranean region. ManuMed is part of the EU's regional program called EuroMed Heritage 1. The event focused on identifying, conserving and distributing Berber manuscripts in Algeria, Morocco and from the Tuareg populations, as well as within European collections.

H.M. King Mohammed VI Donates US$ 1.3 Million in Equipment to Rabat University Hospital

RABAT, Jan.21 - H.M. King Mohammed VI donated US$ 1.3 million in medical equipments to the Rabat Ibn Sina University Hospital, destined for 13 wards, including the emergency, reanimation, surgery, radiology and laboratory ones. Morocco's Health minister, Mohamed Chiekh Biladillah, told reporters that the royal donation will allow Ibn Sina university hospital upgrade its services and meet patients' needs, particularly those of the needy.The royal donation has made it possible to change old equipments with sophisticated ones, said the hospitals' director, Fanid Ammar, noting that with the royal gesture the health ministry now has a lithotripter, an advanced devise that treats kidney calculus, without surgery. This device will benefit the needy through a less costly treatment, he said, adding the other equipment will improve the hospital's performance, considered as the largest in Morocco with a treating capacity ranging from 5,000 to 6,000 patients per day.

AGADIR, Jan.20 - H.M. King Mohammed VI received here on Monday, Driss Dahak, chairman of the consultative commission in charge of the revision of the personal statute code (Moudawana), who submitted to the sovereign a draft copy of the personal statute code, says a communiqué of the Royal household and chancellery. During the audience, Dahak also submitted to H.M. king Mohammed VI a request by the commission members asking for a new deadline to finish elaborating the family code project, along with its annexes, and settle some pending issues, adds the source. H.M. King Mohammed VI said that he will take the most "appropriate" decision as to the content of the project, the commission's request and the progress of its work, adds the communiqué. The sovereign is determined to see adequate conditions gathered for the completion of the personal statute code project, in line with H.M. the King's directives, the communiqué further says. The audience took place in the presence of Mohamed Moatassim, royal adviser.

Morocco is envisaging the construction of a port near Kenitra on the Atlantic coast. Infrastructure authorities of the provinces of Kenitra and Sidi Kacem organized a one-day meeting to review the technical feasibility and economic details of the project. The findings of a study conducted by the French-Moroccan consulting firm CID were presented during the meeting. The CID report analyzes the macroeconomic conditions in which the port is expected to operate and includes traffic projections in 2006, 2012 and 2020. The CID report also defines the infrastructure and equipment needs of the future port, the estimated cost to complete its construction and the review of the potential sites that could host the port.

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