Survey: 71% of Moroccan Businesses Fear Economic Impact of Potential New COVID-19 Lockdown

A survey by the High Commission for Planning (HCP) indicates that 71% live in fear of facing confinement again and its impact on their turnover. The objective of this survey is to "note the level of business resumption following the lifting of confinement, to note the constraints that hinder this resumption and to identify the adaptation measures they have initiated to adapt to the new post-confinement context".

By category of companies, half of the very small enterprises (VSEs) find that "the restrictive measures put in place by the administrative authorities do not favor a safe resumption. In order to limit the spread of Covid-19, they constitute an obstacle to a normal resumption of the company’s activity, indicates the HCP in a note on the resumption of business activities following the lifting of confinement. This rate reaches 45% for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and nearly 36% for large enterprises (LEs), according to 2M.ma.

The HCP also points out that 62% of exporters complain of the decline in export demand as a "specific and predominant obstacle to the resumption for this category of companies". Several sectors also complain of financial difficulties. These are textiles and leather, agri-food, electrical and electronics, transport and storage as well as accommodation and catering.

In addition, the HCP indicates that 77.4% of companies say that the current situation of their equipment allows them to perfectly protect employees against covid-19, 16.4% of them say that the protection is only partial against 6.2% who say that the equipment of their companies does not guarantee any protection, the same source specifies.