The Duke of York’s speech at the Moroccan-British Business Dinner in Casablanca,
1 November 2007
Ladies and Gentlemen,
It gives me great pleasure to be able to join you this evening at this Moroccan-British Business dinner. I am delighted to see so many of you here tonight. Thank you very much indeed for your extremely warm welcome.
This is my second visit to Morocco in my capacity as the UK’s Special Representative for International Trade and Investment. My first visit was in 2004 and I promised then that it would not be a one-off visit. I am pleased to be back now – within the time frame I set myself – and I can assure you from the start that I see my visits as part of a regular series of visits aimed at promoting business ties between our countries, stimulating trade flows and encouraging two-way investment. I believe that there has never been a more opportune time for our companies and businesses British or Moroccan to learn from each other and to do business together.
These aims may constitute an ambitious agenda. But, judging from the programme, the Ambassador has ensured that I have two days packed full of events and meetings that will help to achieve these objectives. And of course I will be back again to further encourage stronger business and other ties between Morocco and the UK.
This evening I would like to touch on three issues: First I would like to explain a little about my role for the United Kingdom as the UK’s Special Representative for International Trade and Investment. I would also like to speak about the change that I see in Morocco since my last visit. And finally I would like to suggest why I believe that there has never been a better time to increase trade and investment flows between our two countries.
I have now been working as the UK’s Special Representative for International Trade and Investment for more than 6 years. In this role I help businesses of all nationalities in the United Kingdom to develop and I encourage them into trading internationally from the UK across the globe. Equally as important is the need and my pleasure from encouraging overseas businesses to come to the United Kingdom as investors and to use the UK as a springboard for international growth. In the UK I make regular visits around the business community. And in doing so I am able to learn a great deal about sectors and industries where the UK has particular strengths, and to understand where companies have the capability to trade successfully in the international market. I was delighted to see from the guest list this evening, that there is good representation from UK companies in this market.
The United Kingdom is a liberal, globalised economy that has long been one of the World’s most open trading nations. We have moved from an industrial to a knowledge based and value added services led business environment. Increasingly our prosperity and the competitiveness of our industry depend upon our ability to trade and invest freely overseas.
So a key part of my role is to make visits all over the world in support of the UK’s globalised economy and to encourage greater and freer trade between nations. In doing so I meet a wide cross section of leading political and business figures and am able to discuss how our companies might work more closely together. I am also given excellent opportunities to see and recognise the work of UK companies at first hand, understanding their operations overseas and to hear of their local partnerships and their business development plans. And in doing this I endeavour to identify strengths and opportunities that enable business in and with the UK to grow.
Relations between Morocco and the UK are of course of long standing. They could be said to stretch back to Roman times, when the legion stationed here comprised many Scots legionnaires. But there was a bit of a gap before the first British Consul and commercial agent was appointed in the early seventeenth century.
More recently, the UK, like all your many friends, has been impressed with your pace of social and economic development. We applaud the impetus it has received from the personal commitment of His Majesty The King. Morocco stands as a shining example with its programme of social, political and economic reform, making such a positive difference in many areas of Moroccan life.
The General Election in September rightly drew international plaudits for its peaceful and orderly nature. And I noted with interest that the new Government announced two weeks ago is showing others the way forward in terms of participation – some 20% of the Ministers in the new Government are women.
Morocco is increasingly, and in my view rightly, seen as a country of great opportunity. One recent testimony to the increasing international recognition of your progress has been the raising by Fitch Ratings of your international investment grade; another is the World Bank’s Doing Business chart gives Morocco a similarly good write-up; and Morocco is now the largest single recipient of EU programme aid. These all contribute to a good and continually improving track record that will help to attract foreign investment.
Morocco is increasingly providing the right climate for foreign business. I know that many of the principal British companies are already active here – Shell, GlaxoSmithKline, Unilever, Price Waterhouse, Cadbury, Coats Vyella and Scott Wilson; to name a few.
I know that you are keen to see more. I am therefore delighted that the Middle East Association (of which I am coincidentally Patron) is visiting this week, with a dozen UK companies keen to explore the potential in various sectors and to expand their business contacts with Morocco. And I was pleased to hear that there was a good response to the MEA seminar on Doing Business with Morocco in London the week before last. I do hope that new agreements and business will flow out of both these initiatives.
I shall have meetings with some of the UK companies doing business in Morocco during my visit and I will be seeking insights into how companies can build successful strategies here. I shall also hear from leading figures in the Moroccan commercial world about the opportunities that are available here and will be making these known to the UK business community when I return.
Morocco is increasingly successful in attracting British visitors – and that we now spend more nights in Morocco than any other nationality (apart from the French). I can understand the attraction of the combination of wonderful climate, beautiful scenery and warm welcome. I was therefore not at all surprised to hear that many British people were succumbing to Moroccan charms and building businesses in the tourism sector. I merely wish that on this visit I was able to make a greater personal contribution to the number of nights stay in Morocco!
While this is one successful example of attracting UK investment, I know that in recent years Morocco has perhaps not quite kept pace with other countries in attracting British investment. I know that many Moroccans have been wondering how to reverse this trend, and I hope that in the course of my meetings and engagements here I will be better able to understand the offer that Morocco has, and to help convey that message in the UK.
We too would welcome more investment from Morocco into the UK. The UK is the most open market in Europe and not unreasonably, therefore, the most favoured inward investment location in Europe. The UK economy has benefited greatly from this wave of foreign direct investment from the best companies in the world. Their successful investments have played a direct role in making Britain the strong, dynamic, open and successful economy that it is today. And companies investing in the UK tell us that it has made them more successful by helping to access new markets and create more successful international business.
Another area where I am sure there is more scope for cooperation is in the field of financial services. I am aware of Morocco’s ambitions to become a regional and continental hub for financial services. This is clearly a natural future role for Casablanca given the importance of your Stock Exchange, the second in Africa after Johannesburg. MediCap, a branch of BMCE, is now established in the City of London. Your support for African banks and businesses is accelerating and is being noticed in other financial centres, such as our own, which themselves have a long standing interest in sub-Saharan Africa
All this makes you a natural partner for the City of London. I am glad that one of the Vice-Presidents of the Confederation des Entreprises du Maroc recently visited the Corporation of the City of London to establish contact with them.
The City leads the world in financial and legal services. This is reflected in our share of global and financial markets. London is the world centre for foreign exchange. The London Stock Exchange features some 600 foreign-owned businesses from sixty countries on its list of nearly two thousand companies. I heard it best explained by a senior banking figure who said that if you want to do business in the US and finance in the US then you go to New York and get on the New York Stock Exchange. The same is true in Tokyo you deal with Japan. But if you want to do business with the Globe you come to London and from London you can do business with the World.
London is also growing its Alternative Finance expertise and I know that a range of Alternative banking products have recently been introduced to the market. In fact the Lord Mayor was only last night speaking about this in a speech at the Guildhall in honour of King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia and that in the first half of this year, two of the largest Sukuk bonds were listed in London, with the first ever billion dollar bond being raised through the London Stock Exchange. This is a growth area in the City, and one where we could well develop our relationship.
I hope this will lead to progress. Many of Morocco’s competitors have long been present, working to secure for their countries some of the huge liquidity of investment funds channelled through the City’s vast range of investing institutions. Many of your competitors have regular investment roadshows; and some have permanent investment offices. It would give us all great pleasure to see Morocco making as much of such opportunities and benefiting to the full from what the City has to offer.
One positive factor in all this, of which we in the UK take particular notice, is the change in orientation of many young and enterprising Moroccans. In the past many went abroad to pursue their careers, more young Moroccans, who have completed their studies in France or elsewhere, then to come to London to gain some years of experience. There is the dynamic group from the Maghreb region, called MaghNet, made up of those involved in the financial services. Many then to return to Morocco to make use of the experience they have acquired in London, for their own and for Morocco’s benefit. This is a trend we are keen to encourage, to our mutual benefit. I understand, M le Wali, that your own daughter has recently taken this step after her years in the City.
I very much look forward to hearing from some young Moroccan entrepreneurs, and Chevening students who I will meet tomorrow, about the experiences that they had and the lessons they have learned from their time in the UK.
I should also say that I was delighted to hear that there will be a British School setting up in Casablanca in two years time that will be able to be able to offer access to the best of British education. This will complement the good work that I know the British Council does here to help promote the teaching of English and to help young Moroccans in their choice of academic institutions in the UK.