RABAT Feb 13 (Reuters) – Morocco posted a current account deficit equivalent to 6.5 percent of gross domestic product in 2011, its biggest shortfall since the 1980s, Finance Minister Nizar Baraka said on Monday, due to high prices of grain and oil imports.
“The level was last seen in the 1980s,” Baraka told a news briefing, linking the deficit to these “exceptional conditions”.
The North African country posted a current account deficit of 4.3 percent of GDP in 2010 and Baraka estimated that the economy grew about 5 percent last year, slightly lower than forecast due largely to the downturn in the European Union, a key trade partner.
Official data released last month showed that Morocco’s trade deficit rose 25 percent in 2011 to a record high of 185.7 billion dirhams ($21.2 billion) as the country’s agriculture-reliant economy struggled to counter the rising cost of energy and wheat imports.
Growth in tourism, remittances and investment have helped mitigate any destabilising impact on the banking system from a net outflow of foreign exchange caused by a surge in the trade deficit.
Morocco’s currency is not fully convertible, which means the authorities have to keep a check on the trade deficit to avoid straining the country’s foreign currency reserves. (Reporting by Souhail Karam, Writing by Lin Noueihed; Editing by Susan Fenton)
