Morocco is considering applying anti-dumping measures on tomato paste imported from Egypt, the industry minister said as local industries complain of unfair competition.
The agri-food federation noted in a report that Egyptian imports had a far lower price resulting in loss of jobs for the local tomato paste industry, whose sales plummeted by 14%.
The price gap between Egyptian tomato paste products and Moroccan ones grew from 13% in 2018 to 35% in 2022, the report said.
This led to a drop in national tomato paste production by 10.5% in 2021 and 5.9% in 2022, it said.
The raise in production costs in Morocco complicated the outlook with increasing packaging prices, higher energy cost, as well as higher salaries.
