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AfricaFebruary 2 2005

Euro-Med pact drives reforms

Merger moves in Morocco and the promise of privatisation in Algeria give hope for a more vibrant banking sector in the Maghreb region, writes Jon Marks.
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Ten years after the EU and its mainly Arab southern Mediterranean neighbours committed themselves to a Euro-Mediterranean Partnership (EMP) agreement – widely known as the Barcelona process, after the host city of the 1995 conference – the Maghreb states of north Africa are still waiting for the sort of economic take-off that the creation of a Euro-Med free trade zone promised. Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia know they are condemned to working with their more powerful neighbours to the north, though, and that is driving a new generation of financial sector reforms and consolidation, represented in the creation of a new Moroccan “national champion”, Attijariwafa Bank.

North African economies and corporates are edging along the road to reform, although change has been slower than many would like, even in well-managed economies such as Tunisia’s, where the banking sector is still dominated by local interests.

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