Morocco's cereal imports drop by 36%; 90 percent of tomatoes processed locally

Morocco's imports of cereals from June to October 2003 amounted to 1.08 million tons, dropping by 36% compared to the same period of last year, an official source said.

Argentine is Morocco's first cereal supplier with 28% of imports, consisting mainly of corn, followed by France (23%), the USA (19%), Canada (17%) and Brazil (8%).

Morocco's cereal reserves are estimated at 1.13 million tons, including 0.87 million tons of soft wheat.

Also, nearly 180,000 tons of tomatoes have been processed in Morocco in 2002, which represent almost 90 percent of the country's annual output.

With this quantity of industrial tomatoes, Morocco ranks third after Tunisia (560,000 tons) and Algeria (260,000), during the same period, reports the information bulletin of the National federation of the food industry.