Morocco’s Unemployment Soars to 1.5 Million as COVID-19 Impacts Job Market

Out of 26,797,000 people of working age, 11,648,000 are active, 1,482,000 are unemployed and 15,150,000 are outside the labor market, according to the HCP’s national employment survey in the third quarter of 2020. Thus, in the third quarter of 2020, the activity rate reached 43.5%, 41.0% in urban areas and 48% in rural areas, with 69.9% among men and 17.8% among women.

For this quarter, the employment rate fell by 37.9%, a loss of 2.8 points compared to the same period in 2019. This decline affects all categories, particularly young people and women, with a decline of 2.1 points, from 36.4% to 34.3% in urban areas and 3.7 points, from 48.5% to 44.8% in rural areas, and more critical for women with -3 points compared to -2.6 points for men.

Regarding unemployment, after a decline in the last three years, it has experienced a peak of 3.3 points between the third quarters of 2019 and 2020, rising from 9.4% to 12.7%. Thus, the unemployment rate went from 4.3% to 6.5% in rural areas and from 12.7% to 16.5% in urban areas, from 13.9% to 17.6% among women and from 8.0% to 11.4% among men. The unemployment rate also increased by 3.2 points, from 15.5% to 18.7% among graduates.

Also during this third quarter of 2020, the Moroccan economy lost 581,000 jobs compared to 2019, a 5.4% drop in several sectors. By professional status, the drop in employment between the second and third quarters of 2020 affected all categories. Thus, salaried employment fell by 157,000, self-employment by 264,000 and unpaid employment by 160,000.