Speaking at a conference-debate held at the initiative of the Swiss Chamber of Commerce in Morocco “Swisscham Morocco” in the presence of the Minister of Industry and Commerce Ryad Mezzour, Mr. Oulhaj called for the acceleration of this transformation to benefit from the spinoffs in terms of creation of added value and quality employment, while continuing to strengthen commercial links with traditional partners.
He indicated that despite a moderate growth rate, the Moroccan economy shows resilience in the face of major shocks.
This conference, organized under the theme “Commercial protection: What safeguard measures to defend national production?”, was also an opportunity for Mr. Oulhaj to note that the Moroccan economy seems to be a dual economy where traditional sectors high intensity of low-skilled work rub shoulders with modern highly capital-intensive or technologically intensive sectors, and where the informal coexists with the formal.
At the same time, he recalled that Morocco has experienced a long process of opening its economy, favored by the signing of numerous free trade agreements with more than fifty countries.
“Morocco’s level of integration into the global economy is also reflected by the maintenance of a regular flow of incoming foreign direct investments (FDI) thanks to numerous assets, including political stability, improving port connectivity, incentive measures for large foreign investors, the multiplicity of partner markets thanks to free trade agreements,” said Mr. Oulhaj.
For his part, Mr. Mezzour underlined the importance of commercial protection in the development and sustainability of local industries, in a context of globalization.
“Trade protection is not only a means of protecting consumers against a certain number of inappropriate practices, but also of protecting fair competition between countries,” he explained.
The minister, in this regard, noted that Morocco uses trade protection instruments in an “open” manner, in order to protect national industry against anti-competitive practices.
For his part, Maître Daoud Salmouni Zerhouni, lawyer specializing in industrial property, maintained that Morocco continues to improve intellectual property legislation, through the upgrading of patent legislation during the agreement validation of European patents, improvement of legislation on trademarks and resale rights.
Citing the example of trademark law and article 133 of Law No. 17-97, Maître Zerhouni recalled that Morocco was a pioneer in authorizing the protection of so-called non-traditional trademarks and particularly sound and olfactory trademarks.
The president of “Swisscham Morocco”, Christophe Pierre de Figueiredo, and several experts in industrial and commercial property, as well as Moroccan and Swiss industrialists, took part in this conference.