Morocco:Continuing tourism investment

The Moroccan tourism sector managed to attract Dh14bn (€1.25bn) in investments for a number of developments in 2012. This represents around 93% of the country’s target under its Vision 2020 to attract an average of Dh15bn (€1.33bn) each year according to Oxford Business Group (OBG).

Vision 2020 aims to make Morocco one of the top-20 tourist destinations in the world bringing the number of tourist arrivals uo to 20 million by 2020. Europe has been Morocco's main tourism market and tourism arrivals have suffered because of the financial crisis afflicting the eurozone. Morocco is looking to tap new markets in the BRIC countries as well as continuing its efforts to promote Moroccan tourism in Europe. It hopes to increase the market for British tourists from 500,000 to a million between 2013 and 2020, OBG notes.
 

The  tourism investment seen in 2012 is expected to create 5,500 jobs and add around 12,500 beds by 2015, particularly in Bouznika, Casablanca and Marrakech. OBG lists a number of investment projectsin 2012  which have yielded results including  a Dh4bn (€356.8m) project in the luxury and high-end segment by Caisse de Dépôt et de Gestion (CDG), which signed an agreement in December 2012 with France-based Pierre & Vacances-Center Parcs Group, to develop resorts and residences in Marrakech, Saïdia and Taghazout. The projects are expected to generate up to 900 jobs and add 7200 extra beds to the high-end segment by 2016.
 

The planned luxury  residence in Marrakech, Oasis Noria, is expected to be ready in 2015 and will add 2400 beds to the sector. Meanwhile, the Saïdia project, currently being developed in the coastal town of Saïdia near the Algerian border, will include three five-star hotels, upscale residences, three golf courses, a marina and several retail facilities.
 

 Taghazout,  north of Agadir, will have 250 houses and apartments, adding 2,700 beds by 2016. In 2012 Agadir registered its highest record in visitor numbers, with more than 810,000 arrivals and more than 4million nights spent at the city’s hotels, a year-on-year  increase of 4.05% in arrivals and 0.24% in nights spent. According to Lahcen Haddad, the minister of tourism, Morocco is forecast to attract between Dh20bn (€1.78bn) and Dh30bn (€2.68bn) in investment in 2013.
 

The Moroccan Tourist Engineering Society (Société Marocaine d’Ingénierie Touristique, SMIT), has initiated a number of feasibility studies, aiming to attract up to Dh38bn (€3.39bn) in investment in 2013, thus adding some 36,000 beds and creating more than 10,000 jobs over the long term. “Up to 2020, the aim is to attract some Dh150bn (€13.4m) in investments in the tourism sector,” Imad Barrakad, the chairman of SMIT, told OBG. “In particular, investments are sought from Gulf countries.”
 

Part of the focus for new capital projects in the sector over 2013 will be on niche segments, such as medical tourism.  Marrakech Healthcare City (MHC), which is being developed by UAE-based Tasweek Real Estate Development and Marketing, will build a 160-bed hospital,  with 56 high-end apartments and a luxury hotel with 40 rooms. The $40m project will spread over 21,000 sq metres and is expected to be complete in the next two years. The MHC hopes to attract up to 5,000 patients annually.
 

Marrakech  overall arrival numbers drop by 2% between January and September 2012, compared to the same period in 2011, while passenger traffic at Moroccan airports was down 4.73% y-o-y in the same period. The  financial crisis in Europe and instability in the region as the reasonforthe decline. To this end, the government  announced that the Moroccan National Office of Tourism (ONMT) will receive a 15%  increase in funding in 2013 to improve its global promotional campaigns.

The $210 million investment by Ryanair in two bases in Marrakech and Fes is also highlighted by OBG as an important addition to Morocco's ability to expand its tourismnumbersas the bases will serve a number of destinations in Europe. The open sky policy initiated in 2006 helped to rapidly expand thenumber of tourists visiting Morocco. A dispute between Ryanair and the Moroccan airport company ONDA over handling charges last year led to Ryanair threateningto cut a number of routes to Morocco but the agreement on establishing the two bases in Marrakech and Fes has averted this prospect. A number of Moroccan tourism professionals  reaffirmed the importance of low cost airlines in boosting continued tourism  numbers in Morocco.