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Drought threatens Morocco's bread basket economy: World Bank

Last year, the Maghreb experienced one of its worst droughts in decade, causing a 60% decline in Moroccan cereal production.
Wheat in Morocco

Drought and other adverse climate conditions mean another poor year for cereal production in Morocco and could potentially pull the North African country’s economic growth below projections, the World Bank has warned.

Morocco’s Ministry of Agriculture announced in April that its cereal production projection for the 2023 harvest stands at 55.1 million quintals, a 62% rise from the previous year. One quintal is 100 kilograms.

Javier Diaz Cassou, senior lead economist at the World Bank, finds the figure troubling. “This would indeed be a significant improvement from last year’s crop, which is estimated at 34 million quintals,” Cassou told Al-Monitor. “However, it is still significantly below Morocco's historical average, which stand in the vicinity of 70-75 million quintals.

“In other words, persistently adverse climatic conditions will result in another relatively poor agricultural season this year, which could pull GDP growth below the projections that most analysts advanced at the beginning of the year,” Cassou added. 

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