El mahjoub Dasaa
American think tank the Heritage Foundation released their annual Economic Freedom Index, placing Morocco 97th in the world, with a score of 58.4.
The ranking positions Morocco as first in North Africa, the only country in the region to crack the top 100.
Morocco received different points for the sub-indicators; Among them is the rule of law index, which includes various criteria, including the intellectual property protection standard, in which Moroco scored 57.1 points, while the judicial effectiveness index scored 32.8 points, and the government integrity standard scored 38.7 points.
The second sub-indicator is related to organizational efficiency, which consists of the standard of freedom of doing business, which scored Morocco 65.3 points, in addition to the standard of freedom of action, in which Morocco scored 47.6 points, as well as the standard of monetary freedom, which scored 78.3 points.
As for the third sub-indicator, it is concerned with the size of the government, which is formed from the measure of tax burdens, in which Morocco declined this year, after obtaining 67.9 points; While it scored 72.0 points in the standard of government spending, while it achieved 41,368.5 points in the standard of “financial health”.
The fourth sub-index is concerned with market openness, which is based on its assessment of the freedom of trade standard, in which Morocco scored 64.4 points, in addition to the investment freedom standard, which granted it 65.0. Points, without ignoring the financial freedom criterion, in which it scored 70.0 points.
At the level of the Middle East and North Africa region, the Kingdom of Morocco improved its ranking and moved from ninth to seventh place in the Arab world, behind the United Arab Emirates, which topped the Arab countries, followed, respectively, by Israel, Qatar, Bahrain, Jordan, Oman, Morocco, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Mauritania, Tunisia, Egypt, Algeria, while Iraq, Libya, Syria, Yemen, Afghanistan, Somalia, Liechtenstein, and Ukraine were not classified due to the instability of the political situation.
The report of the American Foundation, which is based in Washington, revealed that Morocco’s economic freedom score is 58.4, making its economy the 97th freest in the 2023 Index. Its score is 0.8 point lower than last year. Morocco is ranked 7th out of 14 countries in the Middle East/North Africa region, and its overall score is approximately the world average.
The report highlighted that Morocco’s gradual but notable progress is due partly to economic reforms that have encouraged private-sector dynamism. Competitiveness has improved, and the productive base has diversified. Some challenges, however, will require deeper institutional reforms. The labor market is not flexible, and much of the labor force remains marginalized in the informal sector.
