Morocco’s King Launches Construction Works of City of Trades & Skills in Agadir Region

King Mohammed VI on Thursday launched in the region of Agadir the construction works of a local City of trades & skills and chaired the signing of the related funding agreements.

Agadir’s city of trades & skills will be built over a 15 ha area. It will cost over $ 44.5 million. The City will be able to host annually up to 3,000 students who will be trained in various trades and sectors including industry, digital & offshoring, management & commerce, tourism & hotel business, health, construction, agriculture, fisheries, agro-industry, handicraft…

This project is part of the $378 million program of the planned 12 Cities of Trades and Skills to be launched in all the regions of the Kingdom by 2023.

 

These Cities are expected to train annually a total of 34,000 students in various sectors.

The Cities of trades & Skills of Rabat, Salé, Kénitra, Nador and Laâyoune are projected for 2021.

At the beginning of the signing ceremony of the funding agreements, director general of the Office of Vocational Training (OFPPT), Loubna Tricha, outlined, in a speech before the Sovereign, the reform and development projects undertaken by OFPPT in line with the royal guidelines for the modernization of vocational training.

The aim of these projects is to provide quality training responding to the needs of the labor market, making vocational training a driver of development, employment and social inclusion, she said.

The OFPPT is working with professionals to overhaul and upgrade its training offer, added Mrs. Tricha, noting that the Office has updated its training programs in all sectors to offer trainees new skills meeting the needs of industries and regional ecosystems.

In 2019, the OFPPT acquired a platform for foreign languages teaching which will be operational starting the next academic year, said Mrs.Tricha, affirming that the Office is busy working on a new program aimed to encourage entrepreneurship and self-employment initiatives within the frame the Integrated Program destined to support enterprises and facilitate their access to funding.

The positioning of the City of Trades and Skills near the industrial center of the Souss-Massa region will establish the link between professionals and training centers. The city will open its doors in the academic year 2021.

King Mohammed VI inaugurated earlier on Thursday in Agadir, the Souss-Massa Innovation City.

The Agadir innovation city, which cost the State treasury $4.3 million, is part of the regionalization of the Industrial Acceleration Plan, launched by the Sovereign on January 28, 2018.

The City seeks to encourage entrepreneurship and the creation of innovative start-ups, support the local economic sectors & industrial ecosystems, and facilitate the transfer of technology and contacts between companies and R&D structures.

It boasts business incubators, a R&D Centre hosting several scientific laboratories, one-stop shop for entrepreneurs, 14 starts-ups, three clusters (Agadir Haliopôle, Agrotech, Logipôle) and three support structures (Réseau Entreprendre-Agadir, Associations initiatives Souss-Massa, X-HUB).

The inauguration of this City will give a new impetus to industrial development of the region, which offers huge business opportunities to investors in various high-value sectors, including fisheries, tourism, hotel industry, handicraft….

 

Minister of Industry, Trade, and Green & Digital Economy , Moulay Hafid Elalamy, told reporters that the projects launched in Souss-Massa primarily aim to create jobs for the benefit of young people in the region.

Highlighting the tremendous evolution witnessed by Souss-Massa in recent years, he recalled that the various projects launched in the region created 24,000 jobs, a figure that goes beyond the set target.

“We are witnessing the emergence of concrete, operational projects that offer jobs to young people and in implementation of the royal instructions, the region is going through a historic moment,” he said.