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The agricultural sector is central to the Moroccan economy as illustrated by the share of the
sector in GDP (between 12.2% and 15.5%, depending on the year and climatic conditions).
Furthermore, the sector is the largest employer in the country (around 40% of active work
force) and employing around 75% of active population in rural areas; and 5% of GDP got from
agribusiness, which contributes to 2% of Moroccan exports. However, a series of constraints
undermine the central role of agricultural central. This includes economic, social, and
sustainable development issues.
Economic issues :
The Moroccan economy is heavily dependent on agriculture so that the GDP is volatile,
especially with drought and climatic conditions being even more severe with climate changes.
The overall negative food trade balance implies weaknesses on at least 3 levels: insufficient
participation in the World agricultural trade, mainly with products with high added value and
high productivity; poor distribution systems to meet changes in consumers preferences; and
low capacity to adapt to international requirements in productivity and competitiveness.
Compared with Mediterranean neighboring countries, Morocco experiences very high share of
active population (40% vs. 19% in Tunisia and 6% in Spain) with the lowest agricultural
productivity. Additionally, increase in agricultural production is due to overuse of lands rather
than improvement of productivity, with predominance of sectors with low added value, low
use of credits due to high transaction costs , weakness of subsidies (only 5% of farmers vs.
over 30% in the EU and 20% in the U.S.); and low public and private investment.
economically viable, based primarily on direct intervention of the State in marginal areas with
focus on the adherence and professional organization of the beneficiary population, especially
women, and taking into consideration natural resource management and environmental
dimension. This section presents the analytical framework employed in this study: technical
efficiency of Argane oil production, Cost Benefit Analysis of Argane projects and sampling
method and design of survey instruments.