Rabat, 12/01/2023 (MAP) – Bank Al-Maghrib (BAM), Morocco’s central bank, has worked to reduce the costs of remittances from Moroccans living abroad and to diversify the transmission channels, the BAM Wali (governor) Abdellatif Jouahri, said Thursday in Rabat.
« The government and the Central Bank have worked together and in coordination with the banking sector to consolidate this momentum by promoting, in particular, the diversification of transmission channels and the reduction of costs, » said Jouahri who spoke at the opening of the Rabat Forum on the reduction of the remittance costs for the African diaspora.
Revenues from Moroccans in the World recorded a historic jump of 37% in 2021 and 13% in 2022, reaching 8% of GDP, he recalled, noting that « Morocco has developed, for several decades, a solid banking infrastructure based on a transnational presence of proximity which is a major asset for the support of « our compatriots in their countries of residence. »
« In Morocco, we were sensitive to this issue of cost very early on. In fact, Bank Al-Maghrib decided in 2009 to lift all exclusivity clauses binding international money transfer operators to their partners in Morocco. This measure has significantly reduced these costs, » he said.
Moroccan banks are present in 27 countries of the continent and have subsidiaries and branches in 7 European countries and about fifty representative offices across different regions of the globe, noted the governor of the Moroccan central bank, which reported, however, some challenges.
In this context, he mentioned the case of the European Union, where several banking authorities have decided to suspend the intermediation activity operated by the banking subsidiaries located in Europe with the diaspora and on behalf of their Moroccan parent companies, he said, informing that the conditions of provision of this activity will be further tightened if the draft European directive on third country branches is voted as it is.
