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The Covid-19 pandemic has caused major disruption to the global economy. For many developed and developing countries, tourism is an important job-generating industry that got hit hard by the global health crisis and the travel restrictions implemented to avoid contagion.
To measure the coronavirus health crisis’ impact on tourism, the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) released last week its report entitled «Covid-19 and tourism».
According to the report, Morocco's tourism is one of the most affected among 15 countries, according to a moderate scenario. UNCTAD experts have in fact used computable general equilibrium models (CGEM), using real economic data to estimate the evolution of an economy or a sector.
Hence, it ranks the Kingdom 7th, behind Kenya and before Greece. The report expects Morocco to see a decline of -5% of its GDP in a moderate scenario, while the decline may reach -10% in a dramatic scenario.
The decrease thus varies between 58,907 million dirhams (6,079 million dollars) for the moderate scenario and 110,188 million dirhams (11,371 million dollars) for the most pessimistic scenario.
Skilled and unskilled employment strongly affected
As for sectoral output impacts, the report predicts that recreational and other services will experience a -55% drop in output, and the same would apply to accommodation, restaurants and services. Dwellings will have a -5% decline, while trade, construction, financial services, insurance, air transport and communications sectors are expected to experience a -2% drop. The beverages and tobacco sectors will also have a -1% drop while food and selected sectors are expected to witness a -0.8% decrease.
The same source indicates that the electricity, water, motor vehicles and auto parts sectors will not be affected. Regarding employment, the wage rates for skilled staff is expected to drop between -5 and -9% and between -6 and -10% for unskilled workers in Morocco.
UNCTAD recognizes that international tourism is one of the economic sectors most affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. «The United Nations World Tourism Organization (UN WTO) estimates a loss of 850 million to 1.1 billion international tourist arrivals, $910 million to $1.1 trillion in export revenues and 100-120 million jobs, depending on whether the borders are opened in July, September or December», the authors of the report said.
UNCTAD finally estimates the losses, in the most pessimistic scenario and a 12-month interruption of international tourism, at 3.3 billion dollars or 4.2% of the world's GDP.
