Morocco Leads Africa in Macroeconomic Integration, UN-Backed Index Shows

Morocco is designated as the most integrated African country with a score of 0.809, far ahead of Mauritius, whose score is 0.633. Egypt, Rwanda and Mali are also in the ranking, with respective scores of 0.632, 0.570 and 0.542, the Index specifies in its 2019 edition, published on Friday.

"The best performances are generally recorded in countries whose currencies are easily convertible into other currencies." On this point, the Moroccan dirham and the Rwandan franc manage to hold their own. The integration index also points out that "Morocco, Egypt and Mauritius are the countries currently implementing the highest number of bilateral investment treaties, a factor that strengthens their positions in this area".

In terms of infrastructure integration, Morocco ranks 4th among the most performing countries in Africa (54 countries). The kingdom is also ranked among the high-performing countries in terms of productive integration. As for overall integration, Morocco has a better performance, ranking 4th after South Africa and Rwanda.

By evaluating the level of integration of each Regional Economic Community (REC) and their member countries, the Index shows that "integration levels are relatively low". It also notes that "efforts must be made to integrate regional economies to make them more resilient to shocks of the magnitude of the current covid-19 pandemic".