- Title: Morocco signs deal with Boeing to attract suppliers
- Date: 28th September 2016
- Summary: MARRAKESH, MOROCCO (FILE - APRIL 28, 2016) (REUTERS) VARIOUS OF AIRCRAFT PARTS ON STANDS AT MARRAKESH AIR SHOW
- Embargoed: 13th October 2016 11:05
- Keywords: Morocco Boeing Boeing Co aeronautics Tangier Boeing ecosystem exports Casablanca King Mohammed
- Location: TANGIER, MARRAKESH AND CASABLANCA, MOROCCO
- City: TANGIER, MARRAKESH AND CASABLANCA, MOROCCO
- Country: Morocco
- Topics: Company News Markets,Economic Events
- Reuters ID: LVA00251H91ED
- Aspect Ratio: 16:9
- Story Text: Morocco signed an agreement on Tuesday (September 27) that Boeing Co will seek to attract its suppliers to boost the kingdom's aeronautics industry.
The "Boeing ecosystem" project aims to bring around 120 suppliers of the company to help raise Morocco's aeronautics exports by $1 billion and create 8,700 jobs.
Boeing already has a joint venture with France's Safran in Casablanca to build wire bundles and harnesses for aircraft makers, including Boeing and Airbus.
Tuesday's agreement was signed in the royal palace of Tangier by Moroccan trade and industry minister Moulay Hafid Elalamy and the chief executive of Boeing's airplane business, Raymond Conner. Moroccan King Mohammed attended the ceremony.
"We've signed an agreement that we are going to work with our suppliers and ourselves to create an aerospace ecosystem here in Morocco," Conner said during the ceremony.
Conner and Moroccan officials declined to give details or to say whether some of the suppliers have already committed to open new plants in the kingdom.
Unlike some other countries in the region, Morocco has managed to avoid a big drop in foreign investments since the global financial crisis and the Arab Spring uprisings of 2011, partly by marketing itself as an export base for Europe, the Middle East and Africa.
It has attracted some big auto and aeronautics investors in recent years, including Delphi, Bombardier and Eaton Corp.
Morocco has already exported 5.7 billion dirhams ($590 million) of aircraft parts in the first eight months of 2016, which represent around of 3.5 percent of Moroccan exports. The aeronautics sector has been growing by around 7 percent annually.
Elalamy added that the agreement signified a new era for the aeronautics industry in Morocco, helping raise exports by $1 billion.
"We will be exporting up to one billion dollars from Morocco. This project is important because, as everybody knows, more than 70 percent of the parts it makes are made by sub suppliers. What we agreed with Boeing is to create a full ecosystem that will put together some 120 of its subcontractors who will settle in Morocco to make one billion US dollars," he said.
The chairman of the Moroccan Association of Aeronautics and Aerospace (GIMAS), an association that represents the private aeronautics sector in Morocco, added that the agreement will attract suppliers to Morocco and also recognises the thousands of Moroccan workers in the industry.
"This agreement is a strong signal and a strong incentive for the 15,000 suppliers and subcontractors of Boeing to come to Morocco. It tells them that Morocco is the country where they should be today. It is a country where there is sustainable competition for years to come. Finally, it is a recognition of the work done by the industrialists who are now in Morocco and also a recognition for the 12,000 young people who sustain this sector in Morocco," Hamid Benbrahim El-Andaloussi said.
Morocco expects auto industry exports to reach 100 billion dirhams a year by 2020 thanks to PSA Peugeot Citroen's decision last year to build a factory slated to produce 200,000 vehicles a year. It expects the Peugeot plant to raise industry to 20 percent of domestic product (GDP) from 16 percent. - Copyright Holder: FILE REUTERS (CAN SELL)
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