The sudden halt in tourism activities has hit Morocco hard, but the prospect of the pandemic being brought under control is giving hope to a whole nation.
At the end of February 2020, the new Minister of Tourism, Mrs Nadia Fettah, at a conference organised by the British Chamber of Commerce, could boast of the success of the strategy for the development of the tourist economy in Morocco as elaborated a few years earlier under the title of “Vision 2020”.
Rightly so, the observation was obvious : tourism proudly contributed to Morocco’s economic growth via a 7% contribution to its gross domestic product and the year 2019 could show a new record of tourist arrivals with a total of 13 million visitors, i.e. an increase of 5% compared to the previous year.
A few days after this remarkable intervention, the shadow of the global pandemic fell over Morocco, and like all the other countries on the planet, all tourist activities came to a sudden halt, without warning, and with no clear prospects for recovery.
Faced with anxiety, the wisdom of the ages
One year later, the balance sheet is painful for the countless actors of this emblematic economy of Morocco, and yet, the hope to see this black page turned is stronger than ever.
The resilience of the Moroccans as well as the reactivity of the public authorities have been able to stand up to this worldwide annus horribilis and today all share the conviction that tourism will soon recover its dynamism and its colours.
The first reason for this unalterable optimism is undoubtedly the unchanging beauty of the country and its attractiveness on several sides of the vast world of holiday desires. Morocco’s beaches, its mountains with a thousand hikes, its bewitching medinas, its valleys and oases, its soothing dunes or its earthen kasbahs straight out of the oldest tales, its crafts, everything in this kingdom, between flourishing nature and ancestral traditions, remains intact, vibrant with life, and ready to assume once again the role of a major asset for the tourism of tomorrow.
Morocco in its long history has gone through many other crises.
The capacity to renew itself
The pandemic then provoked a collective and salutary awareness which triggered a radical improvement of tourist services, from the taking into account of the new sanitary requirements to a better development of the country’s potentialities to offer the world a more responsible, more ecological tourism, more in tune with the public’s expectations.
Morocco is ready to welcome back all these visitors who are waiting for an elsewhere within reach and within their hearts.
Marrakech, Agadir, Tangier, Chefchaouen, Fez, Meknes, Aït Ben Haddou, Essaouira…
All these names express the unchanged face of Morocco. And in the heart of these treasures, the ochre city with its ancient scents, its high palm trees, its rainbow gardens, the maze of its shops, Marrakech has not changed either, eternal in its languid beauty.
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