Highlights

Presented by the Minister of Economy, Finance and Administration Reform, Mr. Mohamed BENCHAABOUN, the 2020 Finance Bill which was developed on the basis of the guidelines of His Majesty the King in the Royal Speeches, aims at a GDP growth rate of 3.7%. An objective that is based on the assumption of a cereal crop of 70 million quintals, an average oil price of $ 67 per barrel and an average price of butane gas of $ 350 per tonne.

The 2020 Finance Bill is based on four priorities, including the effective implementation of the Framework Law on Reform of the Education and Training System as a basis for reducing disparities and enshrining the principle of equal opportunities. The setting up of social protection devices, support for the middle class and enhancing the targeting of poor groups are also presented as the second priority of the Bill.

The third priority is to speed up the implementation of regionalization by boosting the regions resources and speeding up the implementation of the Administrative Decentralization Charter.

The fourth priority involves giving a new impetus to investment and support businesses by focusing on the implementation of the recommendations of the third National Tax Conference, pursuing the VAT debt settlement, reducing payment deadlines, and ensuring the establishment of a fund for the promotion and financial support of very small, medium and small businesses.

As for the steps accompanying the 2020 Finance Bill, it is important to refer to the implementation of the framework law on the reform of the education, training and scientific research system, by creating new jobs for a budget of 72.4 billion dirhams. The further implementation of the "Health 2025" plan is also one of the key measures of this Bill, through the creation of 4,000 new jobs at a global amount of 18.6 billion dirhams, while stressing the VAT exemption on vaccines at the national level and on the importation, and the provision of approximately 18 billion dirhams to reduce spatial and social disparities.

This also includes supporting up to 26 billion dirhams the purchasing power of the poor groups and the middle class through the implementation of the commitments in the agreement of the social dialogue, subsidizing the necessities of life within the framework of the Compensation Fund (14.6 MMDH bearing in mind the related procedures), allocating about 9.6 billion dirhams for the implementation of advanced regionalization, and enhancing public investment by ensuring the support to VSEs and SMEs and implementing the recommendations of the 3rd National Tax Conference.

It is important to specify that the 2020 Finance Bill​ was developped on the basis of a set of commitments summarized in the cost of the social dialogue, set at 6 billion dirhams for the year 2020, in addition to the 5.3 billion dirhams allocated during the financial year 2019, the mobilization of financial resources for the regions as well as the value-added tax (VAT) refunds set at 10 billion dirhams. In addition, the Minister of Economy, Finance and Administration Reform stressed in his presentation the pressing need to adopt three necessary measures to control the deficit in relation to GDP, namely the rationalization of administrative management expenditure, the use of innovative financing devices within the framework of institutional partnerships, the active management of State-owned assets and public institutions as well as continuing the process of privatisation.