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Morocco: Building for visitors

In spite of the dampened demand from Europe, the political turbulence elsewhere in the region, and a bombing in Marrakech, the Moroccan tourism sector is seeing significant countercyclical expansion this year as new foreign investment in hotels boosts supply, aided by an ambitious government-backed strategy aimed to increase both bed capacity and visitor numbers in one of the country's largest GDP contributors.

The first Four Seasons Hotel in Morocco, and in the Maghreb region, opened its doors in November in Marrakech. The Dh1.7bn (€152m) project, jointly carried out by the Saudi Kingdom Holding Company and its subsidiary, Kingdom Hotel Investment, covers some 15 ha and consists of 141 rooms. The chain is planning a second hotel in the country in Casablanca, scheduled to open in 2013 in the Anfaplace Living Resort.

The Four Seasons is only one of many international hotel operators that have been pouring into Morocco in recent years. Sheraton, Hilton, Ritz-Carlton and Oberoi, for instance, are also present in the country, and more hotels are planning to join them: Oetker Collection will open its Dh560m (€50m) Palais Namaskar in March 2012, and Sofitel is planning two hotels in Agadir and Casablanca by summer 2012, bringing its total number of Moroccan units to eight. Another two Ibis and two Novotels have already been committed and will begin construction in 2012 for openings in 2013 or 2014.

The government is hoping this investment will continue so it can achieve a target of 200,000 beds by the year 2020, which will necessitate an investment of up to Dh100bn (€8.9bn). In 2010, the country's hotel bed capacity stood at 178,000, a substantial increase from the 97,000 beds in the country in the early 2000s when it launched Vision 2010, Morocco's national tourism development strategy.

The state has since embarked on its second long-term strategy, Vision 2020, under which it hopes to not only increase hotel capacity to 200,000 beds, but create 470,000 new jobs, boost tourism revenue to Dh140bn (€12.54bn), and increase the number of international and domestic visitors to its hotels and resorts.

The new hotels are an integral part of Morocco's plan to welcome increasing numbers of tourists. Indeed, despite the eurozone debt crisis, the Arab Spring and the April bombing in Marrakech, the number of visitors to Morocco has been higher than projected. While the number of hotel stays has dropped slightly over 2010, tourist arrivals have been up by an equally marginal amount. According to the Ministry of Tourism, the number of arrivals in 2011 through the month of September, including the month of Ramadan, amounted to 7.3m tourists, an increase of 2% over the same period in 2010.

Under Vision 2010, investment amounted to Dh104bn (€9.3bn). Under Vision 2020, the government hopes to sustain this upward trend by encouraging investment and extending its tourism offerings. Overall investment in the sector is expected to total Dh12.8bn (€1.14m) by the end of this year alone, up from an average Dh8bn (€714.6m) registered over the last three years. Crucial to this is the establishment of the Moroccan Fund for Touristic Development (Fonds Marocain pour le Developpement Touristique (FMDT), a Dh100bn (€8.9bn) investment vehicle which will funnel capital to targeted areas for infrastructure and capacity development.

And while the government paved the way for private sector involvement in the sector under the Vision 2010 framework, with a number of hotel and resort development plans - such as the Regional Tourism Development Plan (Plan Regional de Developpement Touristique, PRDT), Plan Biladi to encourage in-country tourism and establish eight tourism villages, and Plan Azur to set up six seaside resorts - Vision 2020 aims to accelerate these strategic axes, with a greater focus on attracting investors to lesser-developed regions, and away from the four main Moroccan destinations - Marrakech, Agadir, Casablanca and Tangier.

The country is also looking to explore niche markets such as business tourism. In spite of the country's obvious potential for conventions and exhibitions, it lacks both the profile and site capacity of other Mediterranean destinations such as Istanbul. As a result, the Ministry of Tourism has already selected consultants to carry out studies into the potential of business tourism and a promotional campaign is set to be launched by the end of the year or early 2012.

With continued investments flowing into the country and the government's strong commitment to diversify its offerings under its Vision 2020, the sector's infrastructure is bound to expand significantly in the coming years. That's good news for private investors, who are looking to accommodate the country's new visitors, and for the government, which is banking on investors to help it expand the sector.

© Oxford Business Group 2011