As interest groups lobby for greater control over Morocco’s thriving black-market trade, officials are showing new interest in understanding the informal sector — both in order to better fight it, and in order to learn from its remarkable success. Earlier this year, the prominent Moroccan business federation CGEM (Confédération Générale des Entreprises du Maroc) commissioned a series of studies of informal markets in Morocco, beginning with a close examination of Casablanca’s infamous joutiya (flea market). The market, Derb Ghallef, is both a center of distribution for black market goods and services in Morocco, and also a microcosm for how informal markets function in developing economies. Well-known throughout Morocco and highly popular among consumers, Derb Ghallef is Morocco’s most prominent commercial center. But one could not possibly call it a mall. In appearance, it is more like a shantytown. Approximately 2,000 outlets open onto narrow alleyways, run-through by long ditches only
