France grants Morocco $750 million
Morocco, Economics, 10/3/1998

France decided Friday to grant Morocco an additional financial assistance worth usd 750 Million to help the Kingdom carry out several socio-economic development projects and alleviate the debt burden which strangles Morocco's economy.

The decision was announced in Paris by French premier, Lionel Jospin, at the end of the 2nd session of the Moroccan-French cooperation commission which he co-chaired with Moroccan socialist peer Abderrahmane Youssoufi.

The French aid will help Morocco alleviate its foreign debt amounting to about usd 23 billion. About 19 percent of this debt, or some $4 billion, is owed to Paris.

France also decided to covert about $125 Mln of the Moroccan debt into direct French investments. It is the 2nd debt swapping made by France in favor of Morocco in less than two years.

In 1997, France converted another $125 million debt into French investments that were injected in various industrial projects in Morocco. In addition to this sum, Paris canceled $80 million of Moroccan debts.

The same formula was adopted by Spain which decided in 1996 to convert about $520 million of Moroccan debt into investment projects. The sum represented 40 percent of Morocco's overall usd 1.3 billion debt owed to Madrid. Similar moves are planned with Italy.

Before and during the visit of Moroccan premier to France, Morocco launched repeated calls to France for the alleviation of the debt burden to back Morocco's development process and political alternation experience.

France is Morocco's major client and supplier. In 1997, Morocco exported to France usd 1.2 billion goods, a figure representing 26.9 percent of Morocco's overall exports while imports from Paris stood at $1.6 billion during the same year.

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