Travel expenditure consolidated by 8.3% from 2010 to 2019 to reach 20.9 billion dirhams (MMDH) against an increase of +3.8% only for revenue, noted the Department of Studies and Forecasts Finance (DEPF).
However, the balance of travel still remained in surplus, underlined the DEPF in a Policy brief devoted to the “Potential of internal tourism as a lever for post-covid-19 recovery”.
This increase was mainly led by personal expenses (+9.1% against +2.3 for those on a professional basis), in particular those relating to tourism (+11.9%) and tuition fees (+ 9%), explains Management.
“Besides, these operations are the largest items of expenditure, with respectively 55% and 26% in addition to that linked to the pilgrimage and Umrah (9%)”, specifies the DEPF.
The share of tourism has particularly consolidated by 13 points between 2010 and 2019 denoting “the shortfall for domestic tourism, deprived of resident tourists who increasingly tend to prefer foreign destinations”, underlines the same source.
And to continue that this item which remains relatively compressible compared to the others (pilgrimage and Umrah, tuition fees and business tourism) therefore constitutes “a potential market in which operators should invest by developing adapted packages”. , recommends the DEPF.
Regarding the number of Moroccan tourists going abroad, it has fallen by an annual average of 0.9% since 2010 to reach 2 million tourists in 2019, or 5.5% of the total population.
In addition, the DEPF points out that Moroccan tourists going abroad favor short-haul destinations, namely Spain (39%) and France (38%), noting that the incompressible share of religious tourism represents 9%. departures abroad and has been consolidated annually by +9.6% since 2010, almost driven by Omra (+13.7%) which represents 82% of departures to Saudi Arabia.
The Turkish destination has emerged, with the strongest annual growth (+16.9%) representing 12% of Moroccan departures abroad in 2019, thus gaining 9 points over the last decade. This concentration of tourist activity in France and Spain could only continue given the number of visas for the Schengen area approved in 2019, which reached 544,062 for Morocco (3.6% of total visas issued), of which respectively 57% and 31% for France and Spain.
Indeed, Morocco is the 5th country in volume behind Russia (27%), China (19%), India (6.7%), Turkey (5.4%) and Belarus (4. 3%). Relative to the number of tourists by so much abroad, Morocco is the 1st with 27.1%.
This Policy Brief addresses the main outlines of the issue of reviving the tourism sector, based on a diagnosis highlighting the possibilities of boosting domestic demand and the impact of the segment relating to outgoing tourist flows from Morocco. on the activity of this vital sector of the national economy. Lines of recommendations have been outlined with the aim of injecting new momentum into the dynamics of the national tourism sector, taking into account the endogenous and exogenous trends that are looming on the horizon.
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