Morocco: Improving the international competitiveness of the textile and clothing sector (GTEX/MENATEX)
Overview
Summary
The envisaged impact of the programme is to increase employment and income along the T&C value chain in the five selected priority countries. To achieve this long-term objective, the programme foresees to accomplish two major outcomes until the end of the programme. One is related to the institutional infrastructure around the sector in the priority countries, including policy aspects, where required and is formulated as “Improved business environment and TISI performance in the T&C sector”. The second outcome targets the enterprise level as is formulated as “Improved competitiveness of SMEs in the T&C sector”.
Recipients
Partners
State Secretariat for Economic Affairs of Switzerland
Sustainable Development Goals
Supporting job creation in Morocco
ITC is working through its Global Textiles and Clothing (GTEX/MENATEX) project in Morocco to create jobs and increase the income of small and medium businesses in the textile and clothing industry. To that end, ITC is working with the government on policies to improve the sector’s business environment and improve the sector’s competitiveness.
Strengthening the sector and boosting exports will have an enormous impact as the industry employs up to an estimated 220,000 people, the majority of them women.
Our work centres on boosting the skills and capacity of 35 small and medium-sized privately-owned clothing enterprises in fast fashion, denim and knitwear, three of which are women-owned or managed. We also provide technical assistance to enterprises in select sub-sectors and support Morocco’s “fast fashion eco responsible”.
The GTEX/MENATEX Project is co-financed by the governments of Switzerland, Sweden and Morocco.
Pivoting online to survive COVID-19
The economic fallout of the COVID-19 pandemic hit the sector hard, leading to lower and delayed salaries, reduced capacity, higher costs, cash flow problems and an overall decrease in the competitiveness of Morocco’s clothing and textile sector.
To support the Moroccan textile and clothing industry, we adjusted our approach to focus on digitalizing operations. This helped companies improve their digital processes and online sales, making them more competitive, including in the local market.
ITC also provided an impact study on the COVID-19 crisis, giving stakeholders updated information on the pandemic’s effect on the sector, including employment rates, the number of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) affected, the loss of buyers, and new opportunities in unconventional markets and products.
