Morocco expects economy to grow by 4.5 pct in 2017

The Moroccan government expects the country’s gross domestic product to grow 4.5 per cent in 2017, up from less than 2 per cent in 2016 after the worst drought in decades, a government source said on Thursday.

A budget deficit of 3 per cent of GDP is expected, down from 3.5 per cent in 2016, as the country continues to repair its public finances after huge deficits in 2012.

Morocco’s drought slashed its cereal harvest to 3.35 million tonnes, down 70 per cent from 2015’s record 11 million tonnes.

The source said the government has forecast the 4.5 per cent growth in the 2017 national budget, which will be based on a medium cereal crop of 7 million tonnes.

The source declined to be named because the figures will come out officially in the draft of next year’s budget.

Farm output

Agriculture accounts for about 15 per cent of Morocco’s economy and is the country’s biggest employer, accounting for nearly 35 per cent its workforce, although the majority of cereal-planted areas are small properties owned by subsistence farmers.

Morocco’s central bank expects the economy to grow 1.2 per cent in 2016, slowing sharply from 4.4 per cent in 2015.
Morocco has done more than most North African countries to make painful changes required by international lenders to curb deficits, such as ending fuel subsidies and freezing public- sector hiring. The government still controls the prices of soft wheat and cooking gas.