Morocco, now a regular participant at the World Economic Forum (WEF), made good impression at the first WEF on (MENA) and Eurasia regions, which was held from June 4th to 6th 2012 in Istanbul, in light of volatile economic and social conditions in these two major geographic areas.
During his speech and participation in several parallel sessions and many bilateral meetings held on the sideline of this international meeting with political and economic decision-makers, Mr. Nizar BARAKA, Minister of economy an finance presented Morocco`s experience in several areas and exchanged views on strategic issues that can enrich the development and reform processes launched in the Kingdom.
After a lunch meeting on education and employment issues, Mr. Nizar BARAKA attended the session on "growth and employment challenges ", before being represented among speakers at the session on the small and medium enterprises (SME), held under the theme: "Healthy SMEs, prosperous societies".
At this panel, the Minister presented Morocco`s experience in SMEs field, stating that 95% of Moroccan businesses are SMEs, accounting for 50% of employment, 30% of export, 40% of production and 50% of investment.
He stated that this kind of businesses is the main concern of Moroccan authorities, which were recently very active to enable SMEs operate in a healthy and encouraging business environment.
Within this framework, the Minister particularly pointed to public projects devoted to SMEs such as "Imtiaz", "Moussanada" and "Moukawalati", measures adopted as regards guarantee to facilitate SME access to bank financing and those to remove SMEs from the informal sector and assist them in accessing public tenders and stock market.
All these projects and initiatives helped achieve "positive results", he stressed, recalling that for the World Bank," Morocco is ranked first in the MENA region as regards the volume of guarantees offered to SMEs".
During this forum, Mr. BARAKA also attended and spoke on several panels.