The High Commission for Planning in Morocco (Statistics Authority) expected that the external demand directed to Morocco during the second half of 2020 will witness a decrease of 18 percent, due to the decline in global trade and a slowdown in economic activity at the level of Morocco's trading partners.
According to the Statistics Authority, the volume of national exports will witness a decrease of 25.1 percent, due to the decrease in sales of cars, textiles and aircraft vehicles. While imports of goods will have a decrease of about 26.7 percent, due to a decrease in purchases of processing materials, consumption, raw materials and energy, as well as semi-manufactured.
On the other hand, food imports will continue to rise in light of the increase in purchases of grains, sugar and feedstuffs. On the other hand, it is likely that the investment will witness a significant decrease estimated by "negative" 49.4%, instead of 4.8% in the previous half, in parallel with the decrease in investments in industrial materials and construction activities in light of the stoppage of production units and a decrease in the storage of contractors. It is worth noting that, the underlying inflation rate will witness a slight acceleration to achieve an estimated growth of 0.9 percent in the second quarter of 2020.
Source (Al-Sharq Al-Awsat newspaper, Edited)
