Morocco Launches $4.5 Billion Strategic Investment Fund to Boost Economy Post-COVID

For experts and analysts, the elements of the financial structure of this fund include tax revenues, the issuance of national investment bonds, the sale of "non-strategic" public assets, or the solicitation of foreign financing, particularly from the various development banks. An amount of 15 MMDH from the 2020 State General Budget (BGE) will be allocated to this fund and the mobilization of 30 MMDH will be done with national and international institutions.

In a statement to la MAP, international expert in strategy and economic diplomacy, Amine Laghidi, specified that the amount of 15 MMDH representing a third of the allocations of this fund is already budgeted. According to him, budget revenues mainly from tax sources can also benefit from the valuation of non-strategic assets (land, deposits and buildings, etc.) of certain public institutions, in a logic of cash flow and financial liquidity creation.

"To feed the fund, we can resort to investment bonds to mobilize national debt and cash from hoarding and sometimes the informal sector," explained the expert. Mr. Laghidi indicated that the rest of the financing (30 MMDH) can be mobilized from the African Development Bank (AfDB), the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) and the World Bank.

For his part, Omar Hniche, Vice-President of Mohammed V University of Rabat, in charge of academic and student affairs, defined the approach of the government council. According to him, the intervention of this fund will take the form of direct investment, in the case of large infrastructure projects in public-private partnership (PPP), or indirect by strengthening the capital of companies, especially SMEs (Private equity) for the purpose of their growth.

"The choice of major investment projects to be financed will have to be made on the basis of prior feasibility studies taking into account a number of criteria, including the impact of the project on employment, its ability to reduce disparities, especially territorial ones, and its effects on improving the standard of living of citizens," said the academic.