The centrality of the services branch of activity no longer needs to be demonstrated for the national economy. According to official figures, services represent nearly 50% of the national GDP (or nearly 730 billion dirhams) and employ more than 48% of the active population. And yet, the international benchmark shows that this sector has significant room for progress in terms of value creation and the creation of decent workstations.
As an illustration, this sector represents between 70% and 80% of GDP for OECD countries and the same percentages in terms of employment.
Organized by the CGEM and the Federation of Commerce and Services, the 1st Services Conference which was held this Wednesday, December 18, in Casablanca, brought together different actors from the public and private spheres. And this, with the objective of identifying the levers to be activated in order to enable the very vast sector to fully play its role in the socio-economic development of the Kingdom, which has set itself the ambition of successfully organizing the global 2030.
These obstacles to remove
While considering the diversity of services as a strength, Chakib Alj, President of the CGEM, admitted during his speech that it also makes the implementation of adapted and coherent policies complex.
The boss of bosses did not fail to alert certain obstacles likely to penalize the services sector, dominated by more than 70% by SMEs. These include, among other things, unfair competition from the informal sector and a lack of investment in training. For example, the adoption rate of continuing training oscillates between 40 and 50% in Asian countries, compared to nearly 9% in Morocco.
That said, for Ryad Mezzour, Minister of Industry and Commerce who considers that services and industry are closely linked, the whole challenge is to build mechanisms allowing both branches to create more added value and jobs for the Kingdom. “Our economic fabric must create twice as many jobs,” recalled the minister, who assured that the competitiveness of the industrial sector is dependent on logistics services, for example.
A crucial plan for the success of the 2030 World Cup
Several speakers including Younes Sekkouri, Minister of Economic Inclusion, Small Business, Employment and Skills, underlined the decisive nature of services (transport, catering, hotels, tourism, entertainment, etc.) for success of the organization of the 2030 World Cup. This demonstrates the opportunity to build mechanisms to strengthen the contribution of these sectors to the socio-economic development of the country. Concretely, the Services Conference led to the creation of the “Maroc Services” Group. This structure will have a dual mission: that of promoting Moroccan services both nationally and internationally, and of acting as a task force within the CGEM, also bringing the expectations and demands of the sector to the public authorities. . In addition, an agreement in the field of training, in particular the delegated management of training in the services sector, involving the private sector and the Ministry of Employment and Skills, was also signed during the unprecedented event in Morocco .
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