Morocco's Employment Weaknessess
From International Business Wiki
Moroccan Employment Weaknesses
Morocco, is it a considered a great country to do business with? Does Morocco have what it takes to be a strong country? In this section you will learn about Morocco’s employment weaknesses. The Moroccan government has recently noted that employment was in need of an improvement. Due to the inevitable decline in a more productive agriculture sector, more jobs will be needed in manufacturing and services.
This weakness may seem to become a threat to the Moroccan employment rate, however, with the aid of such programs as the Moroccan Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Economic Upgrading and the US Agency for International Development (USAID) are working together on a project called New Business Opportunities (NBO), which aims to boost Moroccan employment. The following programs and the government have signed an agreement to generate turnover of $175 million and create up to 10,000 jobs. With this in favor, Morocco may have what it takes to save the employment weaknesses of the country. However, with the affect of having such an impact on the nation’s employment, will other companies want to do business with Morocco?
Last year Morocco experienced an unemployment rate as high as 30 percent. USAID is helping the Moroccan enterprises to take full advantage of the free trade agreement, and because of this it offers opportunities for young men between 15 and 34 years old. USAID is assisting Morocco in implementing new law and policy changes in order to help the employment rate and trading in Morocco. "Priorities include stricter enforcement of intellectual property rights, increased transparency in the adoption of new laws and regulations, investment simplification, revisions to tax incentives, bankruptcy reform, and support for financial markets reform," according to a USAID report on Morocco.
According to the Morocco Times, the project will provide support to business associations to help promote Moroccan industry to their US counterparts through presence at US trade shows, promotion of Morocco in key US trade journals and facilitation of trade and investment missions of US buyers and investors to Morocco. Newspapers quoted US ambassador to Morocco Thomas Riley as saying, "We have launched this programme to help Moroccan firms penetrate the American market and identify the best American partners." (http://www.magharebia.com/cocoon/awi/xhtml1/en_GB/features/awi/features/2006/07/13/feature-01)
Morocco has noticed that with a possible welcoming of new tourists it can boom the employment for their country. Tourism in Morocco is expected to generate about 80,000 direct and 400,000 indirect jobs by 2010. (http://www.magharebia.com/cocoon/awi/xhtml1/en_GB/features/awi/newsbriefs/business/2005/06/30/newsbrief-01)
What about women in Morocco? Women in this country have learned to stay conservative for many years but Morocco is continuing to break out more opportunities for the Moroccan women. Morocco is opening more than 286 women's centres and 124 professional training centres to encourage women to be more independent and creative. The geographically-dispersed centres provide quality training to meet young women’s aspirations for areas such as information technology-based management, needlecraft, household management, traditional and modern embroidery, hairdressing and beauty treatment, and fashion. (http://www.magharebia.com/cocoon/awi/xhtml1/en_GB/features/awi/features/2006/10/13/feature-02)
The weaknesses of this country are gradually being improved and are constantly improving their business ethics in order to stay afloat of all their weaknesses. Is Morocco strong enough to do business with?
