One of the world’s greatest rivers passes through Africa’s newest capital. Unlike much of the dry country, mango green Southern Sudan’s Juba does not look like it should have water problems. But the river is more than just murky; it is reputed to contain a wide variety of waterborne diseases.

Most certainly — and most seriously — it carries cholera, the bacteria that has thousands in agony every year and kills dozens. Bottled water was one of the first products trucked in after the 2005 peace accord and because anyone with money will not risk drinking any other water, it became one of Juba’s most lucrative businesses. The cost of the product was also one of the first to stabilize across the town and then go down as a growth in the number of distributors pushed down prices for businesses buying the plastic bottles.

Three and a half years out of a war that lasted more than two decades, Juba is still without any kind of treatment plant. There is little left of a colonial-era water system that was further destroyed by recent road-building efforts by the semi-autonomous southern government.

Juba’s residents get raw water trucked in from the Nile for showers and taps. Blue barrels, originally used for storing and transporting corn syrup, are common in most households. Filling these, around 200 liters, costs $2, however the barrels are often decorated with growths of brilliant green algae, and boiling the water sometimes produces a strange scum. 

Few would choose to drink the water that is often thick with silt. More than one has complained of worms rushing out of taps and showerheads when the water is turned on.

Another can of worms altogether is the problem in those parts of the South that are endemic to Guinea Worm, a three-foot (one meter) long parasite that looks like cooked spaghetti and grows in the human body, wrapped around muscle tissues. It pushes its head out of a blister, usually on the arms or lower legs, after around a year of growth and on contact with water ejaculates around a million fertilized eggs into the water source. When these are drunk the life cycle continues.

Like cholera, Guinea Worm smacks of the mediaeval, and the South has far more than its fair share. When the American Carter Center — formed by U.S. President Jimmy Carter — first got involved with preventing the spread of the disease in 1986 there were 3.5 million cases. By 2006 only 25,217 cases were recorded in the world. Over 20,000 of those were in Sudan.

A study by Juba’s branch of the Red Crescent found that many of the town’s boreholes — far too few for its growing population — were also contaminated with E. coli bacteria. It’s presence in borehole water is used as an indicator of further contamination.

What the wealthy drink

Hotels and richer households commonly use bottled water not only in kettles but also to wash vegetables and fruit.

“We get through dozens of bottles everyday, in the kitchen,” said Bhandari Guruvir, Indian manager of the Sunflower Inn. A sub-manager of the Juba Raha Hotel — at three years new one of Juba’s oldest — said the cost of water is so high that Raha and a group of other hotels in partnership wanted to build a mini-water treatment plant for their use only.

Like Juba’s international and national aid and development workers, businessmen and everyone else who can afford it, the government from ministers to low-ranking civil servants, is dependent on bottled water. Thousands of crates are trucked in every month from east Africa.

Unlike neighboring Kenya or Uganda, where anyone with a steely stomach can drink from the tap, southerners prefer to drink Rwenzori, Aquasipi or other East African brands which, used up and flattened, pave the roads of Juba Town and stack up in banks on their sides.

While water is a great expense for Juba’s hotels and restaurants it is also a money-maker. Most of the flattened bottles and the giant translucent plastic rubbish piles that have been dumped on the road out of town hold a mere 500 ml. In Juba’s heat these small bottles represent only one sixth the recommended daily minimum water intake but are by far the most popular. Part of hospitality across Sudan — whether in the south or north — demands the provision of water and many offices or homes will provide the visitor with one of the small bottles.

Many expensive restaurants charge two Sudanese pounds ($1) for one of the little bottles. Shops and cheaper restaurants charge half that and the lack of small change in the new currency introduced in 2006 has driven up prices that lack graduation. But even this cheaper price is still more than twice what the mostly Ugandan brands cost in their home country.

“Bottled water is the most environmentally harmful, economically inefficient and wasteful way of providing drinking water to a population,” Sam Huston, a water engineer working in the South for an international NGO, said. “These small bottles are the worst.”

But so far there is little choice and, with the small bottles, vendors provide a thirst-quencher that is easy to handle and light.

Already this year 5,878 cases of cholera across the South have been reported with 44 deaths. The bacteria responsible for the disease, which killed many thousands in Europe in centuries long past, live and multiple not only in the human body but also in water.

The local government and the UN children’s agency UNICEF have  tried to reduce the spread of cholera through regulating the water trucks, including registration, chlorination of the tanks and controlling where the truckers collect water. But so far they have been unable to stop the tankers filling up where it is easiest — beside the river. Attempts to get small businesses to take over the management and maintenance locations where the tankers can collect clean water have not yet succeeded.

Cholera figures this year are smaller than in the past two years, around 8,000 cases in 2007 and 20,000 in 2006. Figures are not known for the wartime, but health workers think the crowding of urban areas with former refugees and displaced people and a vastly increased amount of travel are partly  responsible for the high caseload.

Almost nothing home-made

The South produces little but crude oil, and everything from cooking oil to soap is imported — water is no different.

“We bring up and distribute up to 3,000 cartons a week,” said John Wosuk, a southerner working for Shalom, a Ugandan-owned distribution company.

Each carton of Juba’s favorite Rwenzori product — 24 bottles of 500ml — sells for around 14 Sudanese pounds ($7). The cartons are purchased for around $6 at the factory in Uganda and after transport over the rough roads of the South and passed through the as-yet unregulated customs system there is little profit left, although there is increasing demand and always new business to be found whether for new non-governmental agencies, hotels or consular offices. 

Rwenzori — with its attractive and robust-looking bottle — is still the most-asked for water, hotel managers say. It is also the most common type of water on sale and was the first company to enter the market almost as soon as the peace deal was signed.

The bottle’s distinctive shape has also worked its way into many small home grown industries: now liquid soap, car oil, cooking oil, kerosene and numerous other products are sold in the bottles. But Wosuk said there is also another reason for the hundreds of empty bottles collected by street children.

“Some people are trying to make fake water using the empty Rwenzori bottles,” Wosuk said. Bottling, unfortunately, is at the Nile banks. Newer brands have benefited from this and Wosuk said companies like Aquasipi and Hemma are making their mark.

Also growing in popularity is JIT water. The 1.5 liter bottles, decorated with an unlikely looking green island next to a lake, are taking over from the large Rwenzori bottles in most of the small roadside shops.

This water is Juba Nile Water but has been through a reverse osmosis process (the same technique used for desalination — water molecules are pushed through a membrane to a more pure solution, the reverse of normal osmosis) and treated using ultraviolet light that breaks down micro-organisms.

Others, faced by the difficulties of transport — nothing reached Juba from Uganda for a month last year when an underground spring flooded the road — and its high cost are also planning similar plants.

Shalom’s parent company Mkwano — a massive company producing a wide range of soap, oil and other domestic products with 400 distributors in the region — is also interested in setting up its own factory.

“Of course there are issues, or raw materials and land availability,” Wosuk said. But becoming independent from overland supply is crucial. He remembers when the road became a giant lake in 2007. “We just came to the office without doing anything.”

The Egyptian government is working with the World Bank to update its mining legislation, in the hope of drawing international investors to the country’s untapped gold reserves.

The International Finance Corporation (IFC), the private arm of the World Bank, has been working with the government since last year on the new legislation, which is expected to see the sector move toward a greater emphasis on royalties and taxes, as well as a greater stream-lining of bureaucracy. According to Amgad Ghoneim, undersecretary for mineral resources, the new laws will be ready within the next three months.

The current legislation requires foreign companies to enter into joint ventures and production sharing agreements with the government. The practice is common for the oil and gas industry, but makes gold exploration a risky business. Mineral deposits are harder to determine than oil and gas plots, making gold miners uneasy about entering into long-term agreements without a comprehensive understanding of a block’s potential. According to Frank Sader, senior operations manager for Middle Eastern policy reform at the IFC, under the current system more than half of a company’s revenues end up going to the Egyptian government.

“We realize that the legislation in place is not satisfactory for foreign operators,” says Ghoneim. “The new legislation will make us more attractive to foreign investors who want to operate in the Egyptian gold mining industry.”

A handful of gold mining companies already operate within Egypt. The Australian-Egyptian company Centamin runs an open-cut mine at Sukari, in southern Egypt’s Red Sea hills area. Hemsh Egypt, a joint venture between the government and Cyprus-based Matiz Holding, is also operating in the country, as is SMW Gold, a subsidiary of the international firm SMW Engineering.

Time to mine

In 2007, Centamin estimated that the Sukari deposits contained some 9 million ounces of gold, worth around $6 billion at the time. With commodities currently experiencing a bull market, the Egyptian government has clearly decided it is time to exploit the nation’s potential for gold. The Ministry of Petroleum and Mineral Resources recently announced plans for the creation of a new company to explore gold reserves in the country’s eastern desert.

Sameh Fahmi, Minister of Petroleum and Mineral Resources, said on the ministry’s website that after establishing the new mining corporation, the government would sell part of its shares on the open market in order to fund feasibility studies for other potential gold mining plots.

Greater liberalization of the sector is being welcomed by the industry. According to Karim Matar, managing director for SMW Gold in Egypt, the new reforms will “reduce government intervention in the sector and allow it to develop faster. There is huge potential”.

One issue yet to be resolved though involves complicated licensing procedures that can hold mining operations back. Exploration permits for land plots need to be obtained from such diverse authorities as the ministry of petroleum and mineral resources and the Egyptian army. “There is a lot of overlapping,” says Matar. In addition, input prices for the sector are currently high due to a global shortage of parts and labor.

“There are not too many companies that can do drilling, for example, and that means they can charge more for their services,” Matar says, adding that most senior gold mining engineers currently operating in Egypt are foreign.

Despite the challenges, there is already extensive interest in Egyptian gold from a number of companies. SMW Gold plans to spend $15 million during 2008/09 in order to develop two concession blocks in the eastern desert, at Um Balad and El Fawakheir. Having completed initial studies, the company is in the process of testing mineral samples and plans to start drilling this summer. Meanwhile, Josef El Raghy, the chief executive officer of Centamin, recently told local press that five of the world’s top 10 gold producers had visited Egypt in the last two years.

“There are definitely lots of mining opportunities here,” says El Raghy. “The key to unlocking them is in applying the new framework. Reform is long overdue.”

With the lifting of the last remaining customs barriers, Tunisia’s free trade agreement with the European Union forcefully entered into effect on January 1, 2008, opening a range of prospects to the Tunisian economy. Public opinion, however, is proving mixed regarding its effects.

According to the terms of the agreement, Tunisia stands to benefit from importing products that are produced for less in Europe. In turn, Tunisia can concentrate its own production domains where it is more competitive, like olive oil. With this new partnership, the Tunisian government could also consider pressing for free circulation of workers between Tunisia and the EU.

The Tunisian Minister of Industry, Afif Chelbi, highlighted that with this FTA, “Tunisia becomes the first country of the southern shore of the Mediterranean to have finalized the various stages of setting up a free trade zone with the European Union.” In a press conference, Chelbi lauded the success of the gradual process of opening. This process was spread out over 12 years in conformity with the Agreement of Association concluded between the EU and Tunisia in 1995, which entered into effect in 1998. The cancellation of tariffs only concerns customs laws, whereas local taxes (consumption tax and VAT) are maintained.

Chelbi celebrated the historical achievement of modernization. This success is illustrated by the performance of two key sectors of the Tunisian economy: textiles and the mechanical and electrical industries. Textile exports increased from $1.7 billion to over $4.2 billion in 2007, while the revenues of the mechanic-electronic sector improved by 100%, reaching $4.4 billion in 2007.

Calling on these figures, the minister clarified that globally, Tunisia has quadrupled the value of its sales in Europe to $3.8 billion, even as imports of common products only tripled, meaning a reserve ratio of more than 98% in 2007. Furthermore, the volume of foreign direct investments was multiplied by seven, the number of businesses created in partnership with Europe increased from 40 to 160 per year, and more than 2,000 European companies are currently operating in Tunisia.

Tunisia’s competitive edge

Outsourcing EU businesses, prompted by fierce competition from Asia and rising production costs in Europe, are increasingly attracted to Tunisia citing high local potential and brief waiting periods as advantages in opening Tunisian operations, as well as geographical proximity to Europe. Customs duties erased by the agreement will be replaced with local taxes, and the minister indicated that the prices of imported goods from the EU will be maintained at the same level for Tunisian consumers.

Fatma Oueslati, director of European cooperation, indicated that a new politics of active macroeconomic accompaniment is being set up. The system of multi-sector reforms aims both to protect the country against potential risks and to maximize the benefits Tunisia will derive from the opportunities afforded by the new free trade zone of industrial products. Tunisia has also recently begun negotiations with the EU concerning the liberalization of agriculture and services.

Tunisia has enacted numerous accompanying programs to secure safe passage into the agreement, notably the National Plan for Upgrading Industry, the Plan for Industrial Modernization (PMI), and the Fund for Accessing Exterior Markets (FAMEX). These reforms have society-wide impact and touch all domains of economic activity, such as the progressive liberalization of commerce and foreign trade, fiscal reform, promoting communications and new technologies, and the modernization of ports and airports. Other modernization reforms include those introduced in the banking sector, universities, education and job training, transportation, and the setting up of regional business centers.

Some Tunisians, perceiving the FTA as a double-edged sword, are calling for caution. Monia Jeguirim Essaidi, Director of the Center for Young Leaders, noted that “Tunisian businesses may now underwrite the effective promotion of their products in Europe, but solely on the condition that they modernize their tools and their production processes.” Others see new horizons for growth and hope. The General Secretary of the Association of CEOs, Hedi Jilani, thinks that the country has crossed a new frontier, “full of challenges and rich in promises and ambitions.”

Yet, other politicians and executives do not share this optimism. Moncef Mouallehi, President Director General of a private business, warned that “this agreement is made to the detriment of the Tunisian labor market and the number of unemployed will increase.” The opposition Party of Democratic Union (Parti d’Union Democratique) is concerned that this agreement will only widen the economic chasm between Tunisia and the EU. “In the absence of protections, Tunisia and similar countries will content themselves with being consumption markets for products from the European industrial machine, for as long as citizens hold onto their purchasing power,” it noted.

Tunisia must allay these anxieties and reinforce its economic and commercial integration into the Euro-Mediterranean sphere of business and commerce. In order to  successfully achieve these results, Tunisia will rely upon bilateral free-trade agreements signed with Morocco, Jordan, Turkey, the European Association of Free Trade (Norway, Switzerland, and Iceland) and the Agadir Agreement.

In this way, Tunisia can strategically assure its successful integration into regional and global economic domains, carrying the aspiration for qualitative advancement and for a market that is orchestrated around the best interests of the country’s development.

In San Francisco, a “bedouin” is a young urban freelancer, saddled with the latest in laptops and cell-phones, who has traded in the sedentary lifestyle of the office for the nomadism of frequenting wifi cafes. In Mauritania, a sparsely-populated desert country on the Atlantic coast of Northwest Africa, the number of nomads is actually shrinking as drought and urbanization sedentarizes the original bedouins. Those who preserve this ancient way of life, however, are benefiting from their first-ever access to cellular technology.

With telecommunications markets in Europe and North Africa reaching saturation levels of over 100%, providers are looking for growth in sub-Saharan Africa. Phones are rapidly penetrating Africa’s remotest regions, as European and Arab companies compete to tap into one of the world’s last remaining non-wired areas. Improvements in cellular technology have facilitated penetration of these regions, opening them up to communications and information-sharing on an unprecedented level.

A decade ago Mauritanians had to wait, on average, two years for installation of a landline; today, advancing technology and the falling costs of calls and mobile handsets mean that modern forms of communication are more accessible than ever before. The capital Nouakchott’s mobile market features the latest Nokia, Siemens, and Motorola handsets and accessories imported from Europe.

Connecting the economy

Beyond the social and educational benefits of improving communications, the dynamic African telecommunications sector is attracting major foreign investment flows and creating thousands of new jobs in the formal and informal markets. National economies swell by billions of euros through according operating licenses and privatizing state-owned companies.

Industry analysts expect to see the West African market double by 2011 to more than 100 million subscribers. Mauritania’s cellular penetration rate is by far the highest compared to its West African neighbors. A 2003 study uncovered low rates of penetration in Senegal (5.7%), Mali (2.1%), and Burkina Faso (1.9%), while penetration had already reached 13% in Mauritania. Overall, West African penetration is picking up, with the number of GSM users increasing by 58% between 2005 and 2006. Between 2003 and 2007, penetration in Mauritania more than doubled and the most recent study (December 2007) places the rate at 43%.

Noreddine Boumzebra, CEO of Mauritel, attributes the success of mobile communications in Mauritania to the nomadic character of its population. “Mobile services are well adapted to the expectations of the Mauritanian population, who have maintained strong traditions of communication and displacement, which explains the growing success of mobile services in Mauritania,” he said.

Promising potential for growth in the region attracted a series of high bids for operating licenses in Mauritania, three of which have currently been accorded.

Mattel, a Tunisian-Mauritanian subsidiary of Tunisie Telecom, became the country’s first cellular provider in 2000, for a bid of $28 million. Mauritania was the first foreign venture for Tunisie Telecom. “It was a market to conquer,” said Yassine Messai, Director of Services, Offers and Products at Mattel. “Like every mobile operator, we wanted to extend our activity outside of our own country.” The company grew to have 450,000 subscribers by the end of 2007, covering more than 40% of the country’s GSM market. Its strong points are wide network coverage and seniority. Mattel plans to accommodate the nomadic nature of the population by offering ultra mobile services in the future, which will provide customers with a reliable and mobile communications service as they travel between different areas. Mattel currently offers a broad range of pre-paid, post-paid and roaming GSM services.

In 2001, Maroc Telecom became the second provider to enter the market, with its acquisition of 54% of the capital of the historic Mauritanian provider Mauritel in an international bidding process. After ceding part of its capital to the business’s workforce, Maroc Telecom retained control in 2007 of 51% of Mauritel’s capital.

Sector dominance

Mauritel is currently the leading provider, covering 65% of Mauritania’s subscribers and with the greater number of service localities. The company is focusing on streamlining its fixed, internet and mobile technologies. “This fusion will create more synergy between services and a better mutualization of resources, thus optimizing costs, which will allow us to offer services at highly competitive prices to the profit of our clientele,” Boumzebra indicated. Other projects include the construction of transmission dorsals on all the country’s main roads, a fiber-optic liaison between the political capital Nouakchott and economic capital Nouadhibou, and the introduction of 3.5G, the latest generation, into the country. Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) technology is also in the works, which will pave the way for GPS and transportation logistics in the country’s remotest regions.

In a surprising turn of events, the Mauritanian Regulating Authority awarded a third GSM license in 2006 to Chinguitel, a joint venture between private Mauritanian investors and Sudan’s public telecommunications operator Sudatel. Sudatel’s colossal bid of $101 million US was more than four times what Mattel paid for the first accorded license, and nearly as much more than the next highest bid of $34.8 million US, by France Telecom. After a service delay of eight months, Chinguitel forcefully entered into the competition with its launch of the first 3G services in Mauritania. Emmanuel Hans, Chairman of the Board at Sudatel, said at the time that Chinguitel is meant to promote “an image of Sudan different from the clichés about Darfur, which pains us a lot.”

Currently, there are approximately 800,000 subscribers in Mauritania, which represents a penetration of only 43%. Sudatel’s mammoth bid and the apparent restriction of market entry to Arab-African providers somewhat substantiate rumors of procedural irregularities in the according of licenses. On the other hand, some see telephony’s penetration of Mauritania as a successful example of the benefits of South-South cooperation, both for effectively spreading technology through remote African regions and for generating revenue for developing economies, like those of Morocco, Tunisia, and Sudan.

At the Festival of World Sacred Music in Fes, artists and scholars from all over the world converge on this ancient Islamic capital to ruminate on the sacred and its relation to modernity. American gospel singers, Sufi brotherhoods, French postmodern philosophers, Jewish psychoanalysts, Lebanese Maronite Christians and Vietnamese Buddhists are just a fraction of the various groups represented at the Festival’s three events, which aim to promote intercultural dialogue and to advance an understanding of spirituality as inclusive and pluralistic. A more material objective of the Festival is to shine a spotlight on Fes, which is emerging in recent years as a tourist destination with high potential for investments and hospitality.

A nation-wide movement to generate 20% of GDP from tourism by 2010 is pumping new flows of investment into a city considered by many to be a cradle of Islamic civilization in the Maghreb. Years of neglect have taken a visible toll on the nobility of this ancient medina, whose ramshackle poverty poses a stark contrast to the sacred aura of sanctuaries like Al Qarawiyin University and the Madersa Bouanania. The Festival of World Sacred Music and similar cultural festivities form part of a broad campaign to transform the demoded medina of Fes into a hot spot for travelers seeking an out-of-the-ordinary experience.

“The Fes-Boulemane region is a very important tourist destination, of primary importance on the national scale,” said Lamia Hanoune, press officer for the Regional Center of Investment (CRI) in the Fes-Boulemane region. “The Program for Developing Regional Tourism in Fes perceives festivals as a cardinal asset, in the sense that they translate and valorize the patrimonial, spiritual, cultural, and gastronomical riches of the Medina of Fes.”

In addition to hosting the Festival of Sacred Music, Fes’ other annual offerings include Jazz in Riads, the Festival of Amazigh (Berber) Culture and festivals of Melhoun and Andalusian music. According to the Fes CRI, the amount of global investment projects in the Fes region reached a total of $1.36 billion in May 2008, with tourism-related projects accounting for 27% of the 79 projects involved.

A tapestry of heritage

Moroccan culture, a unique blend of Arab, Berber, Andalusian, Jewish, and sub-Saharan influences, has been drawing foreign visitors for more than a millennium. Fes, which celebrates its 1,200th birthday this year, was historically the cultural and spiritual capital of Morocco, world-famous for the scholarship and art in its two bustling medinas.  In the 20th century, as Casablanca and Rabat became the new economic and political centers of modern Morocco, the money and power that infused these capitals drained out of Fes, which fell into a period of stagnation and decay. Today, this humbled city is badly in need of an extreme makeover.

It was not until 2001 that authorities started to see potential in the old imperial city, as just-coronated King Mohammed VI advanced his socio-economic development plan, Vision 2010, in which tourism plays a prominent role. The plan aims to welcome 10 million tourists a year to the kingdom, creating 600,000 new jobs, and bringing in $14 billion of investment. Under the plan, the tourism industry will grow to constitute 20% of the country’s GDP by 2010. Although the 9/11 attacks contributed to a brief downturn in tourism, indicators were quick to recover, and have since been steadily approaching their targets. Between 2001 and 2007, the number of tourist arrivals nearly doubled, with the kingdom hosting 7.4 million tourists last year, compared to 4.4 million in 2001.

Many tourists choose Morocco for its warm, sunny weather, Mediterranean beaches, and close proximity to Europe (these features being enhanced by the kingdom’s political stability and cultural openness towards foreigners). Nearly all Moroccans speak French or Spanish, and top-notch accommodations are easy to find and cheaper than their European counterparts. But what really sets Morocco apart as a tourist destination is its rich Oriental/African culture. The Festival of Sacred Music and similar events, in celebrating this cultural history, at the same time, propel it into the future.

Ali Diouri, the Festival’s Director of Production, sees a synergy between the culture of the city and its spirituality. “The city has a soul — one feels it. Culture and spirituality go together: spiritual inspiration leads to artistic inspiration,” he said. And while Fassi spirituality is decidedly Islamic, it has always been hospitable towards other religions and cultures. The Festival seeks to reflect this openness. “This is a festival of sacred music from all religions, from all cultures,” Diouri pointed out. “We are succeeding in promoting the message that all religions and all cultures sing of one thing, the same euphoria… The city of Fes has always inspired a sense of peace.”

During the one week of the Festival of World Sacred Music, blessed with a robust global budget of $1.89 million, up to six times the normal number of tourists come to Fes. Organizers estimate this year’s attendance at 30,000, reaching 80% of capacity. The Festival and similar events are breathing new life into the medina and laying the groundwork for further social and economic development of the region, which posts high levels of poverty, crime and unemployment.

Need for social development

Poverty stains the city, creating uncomfortable contradictions between the wealth of foreign visitors in Fes for a good time and the misery of citizens who dream only of leaving the country. The development of culture requires decent living conditions, as an old Moroccan proverb reminds us: When the belly is full, the head will sing.

New efforts are already underway. The National Initiative for Human Development (INDH) has invested more than $30 million in human development projects since 2005, with a budget of $13 million for 2008. Mohammed Gherrabi, governor of Fes, called such efforts “overwhelmingly positive, in the sense that they permit the improvement of the living conditions of the population, reinforce the principal of good governance, and implicate and integrate citizens into the economic life of the city, anchoring their confidence in the future.”

Foreign and national investments are stimulating the local economy and creating jobs, as well as renovating antiquated structures and improving human resources capacity. Local press reports that in 2007, $1 billion was invested in the tourism sector, allowing for the creation of more than 13,000 jobs. Global hospitality magnate Accor Group, present in over 100 countries, supports the Festival of World Sacred Music through its Moroccan partner organization Objectif Maroc. A European leader in the hotel industry and a global leader in services, whose hotels include the ubiquitous Sofitel, Novotel, and Ibis chains, Accor Group’s expanding influence in the region is improving human resources potential by bringing the world’s most modern and professional services and training programs to the regional tourism industry.

Impressive growth in business creation proves that social and economic development efforts are already paying off. According to Fouad Ouzzine, director of the Fes Regional CRI, in 2007 a total of 2, 327 operating permits were granted to entrepreneurs (up 10% from 2006), creating 1,000 businesses (up 36% from 2006). From 2003 to 2007, each year has seen an average increase of 33% in terms of business creation.

Mike Richardson’s three-story Café Clock has barely been open a year, and he has already bought a neighboring riad into which he plans to expand his business. He finds that the city’s cultural heritage and spiritual identity are strong assets that enhance its economic potential. Café Clock’s concerts, henna sessions, and art exhibitions succeed in drawing both tourists and locals, with tourists constituting a slight majority (65%, in his estimate) of his clientele. The Festival of Sacred World Music doubled his business. “I came to Fes to buy a house, but now I’ve realized how important the cultural side is. Moroccans love to be entertained… and there is a collective hurtling toward modernity.”

Oujda, flanked by the Algerian border and the Mediterranean Sea, is Morocco’s potential gateway to the East. Geographically cut off from the rest of Morocco, separated by a five-hour train ride from the nearest major city of Fes, Oujda should be developing its trade with Algerian border cities. But since the 1994 border closing, the Eastern region has been forced to deploy other strategies to develop its economy, buoyed largely by public spending to the tune of $40.8 million. Currently, there are plans to develop strategic infrastructure projects that aim to facilitate economic growth and the spread of ideas.

With no formal trade with its Algerian neighbors and an only insignificant black market trade, the Eastern region has earned the sobriquet of the Maghreb’s Strasbourg, modeled after the interesting positioning of its Franco-German counterpart.

In some ways Oujda remains a small case study on the larger questions of social and economic development in Morocco. With a regional population of some two million, dominated by under-25 year olds who make up 57% of the total, Oujda has the possibility to channel its abundant population, numbering 430,000 in the city comparable to the next highest figure of 133,000 in Nador, into an engine of effective human capital.

When examining the city’s and the region’s economic prospects, one finds that the city is doing better than expected, but recent moves toward rapprochement between Algerian and Moroccan authorities could open up even greater possibilities for the land-rich region.

Human capital

Université Mohammed I Oujda remains the region’s premier institution in fostering the burgeoning and young population. The university remains dedicated to investing in its students who come to study tourism, industry, and transport/logistics. For those who make it through the undergraduate and graduate programs few options are available: they can choose underemployment, find suitable work in Morocco’s more prosperous cities, relocate abroad with enough passion, or choose to engage with industries and firms involved in developing operations in the sea-hugging region, especially with maritime projects on the rise. Nador, one of the region’s main cities ranks second in passenger traffic in Morocco and the region as a whole enjoys a close proximity to Spanish enclave Melilla and the Iberian Peninsula, 200 km by sea.

One push by the government and local educational institutions is to fuel growth in supply for research and development (R&D) projects in the region, demanded to a large extent by an increasing number of European firms, who are choosing North Africa as a supply center for their R&D operations, which can be paid for on the cheap. Oujda’s university has developed five research centers to develop an interface for just this purpose, supplying the region’s engineers, business students, and workers to paired firms looking for local talent for their outsourced operations. Two institutions are driving this, Morocco’s l’Agence de Développement de l’orientale (ADO) and Belgium’s Commission for University Development.

When asked about a local brain drain, the university’s secretary general did not seem worried and cited confidence in the region’s organic macroeconomic growth in industries and trade. Other university officials also remain optimistic and believe that new industries are sustainable over the long-term.

At the same time as the region is extending its intellectual presence through such partnerships, in addition to training workers who will eventually move to develop other regions of the country, the Eastern region has established a physical infrastructure aimed at fostering stronger ties with many nearby cities, including healthy trade with Fes via the highway established between the two cities not so long ago. Additionally, moves to market and develop waterway infrastructure are taking place along the Mediterranean, with a new international harbor set up north of Oujda to facilitate growing trade with Europe.

Location, location, location…

However much the region succeeds in cultivating local talent, the question of geo-economic strategy remains, concerning the depth to which the region can find endogenous prosperity. Although major cities in the region can be accessed from the Mediterranean or by air, local infrastructure, needed for business growth, still lags behind demand, slowing growth and development in the process. In response, Morocco’s King Mohammed VI has initiated several projects aimed at putting in place the roads, rails, and connections to shuttle workers and production between cities and ultimately to market.

The Fes-Oujda highway, covering the distance between the two cities with fresh, modern pavement, was initiated in 2007 with projects of $815 million over a three year timeline, in addition to redoing the Oujda-Nador route during 2008. Local development projects will continue to absorb the nearly $4 billion pitted in public spending for job-creation prospects of 71,000 new positions by 2010.

A stronger internal economic position would doubtlessly strengthen consumer demand. This prospect has already been estimated by large Moroccan retailers like Marjane, which is planning to invest $61 million as well as a smaller investment in the region of $20 million by Asswaq Assalam.

Betting on better borders

An Algerian extremist brought about a general scare in Morocco after bombing a tourist target in Marrakech in 1994, leading the late King Hassan II to close the border with the country whose secret services were blamed for the attack. After years of civil war, Algeria’s government crushed dissent and restored order, but the border remains shut. International institutions like the International Monetary Fund (IMF) are calling on the two sides to change course, reporting that “the reopening of the border between the two neighboring countries would greatly contribute to boost trade in the region.”

The border closure has exacerbated problems inherent to the Algerian-Moroccan relationship, allowing the Western Sahara territorial dispute to fester and creating problems within multilateral bodies like the Arab Maghreb Union (AMU). In fact, confidence building measures take backseat to the Sahara question, an issue that continues to block meaningful policies on bilateral relations.

Nevertheless, moves toward rapprochement have been gaining ground, with travel possible by air between the two countries and softer, more diplomatic language towards each other. According to a communiqué from Morocco’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Cooperation, “The Kingdom of Morocco called on fraternal friendship and sincerity in a full normalization of relations with Algeria and a border opening between the two countries.” The ministry added that “Morocco reiterates its willingness to open a new page in relations between the two neighboring countries.” Although Algeria has responded somewhat amicably, the country’s president, Abdelaziz Bouteflika, maintains visa requirements for Moroccans wishing to travel to Algeria, failing to match his Moroccan counterpart’s move in abolishing travel visas years ago.

For now, Algeria’s government believes a closed border signifies punishment of the Moroccan economy, to the tune of $500 million. Although no one knows for sure of the economic implications of the gate opening at the border, some reports use evidence from the 1980s, when the border was briefly opened, that Algerian domestic prices, being much lower than those in Morocco, would rise while Morocco’s prices would fall, thus arriving at a new equilibrium. Conversely, with Algeria income packing more bang than Moroccan salaries, it would seem that Algeria’s prices would fall and its workers would lose in competitiveness.

Now, however, Algerians are barely richer than Moroccans and want to guard industries established in Algeria to serve the country’s larger population instead of opening production for pan-Maghreb consumption.

With rapprochement prospects still remaining lukewarm, officials believe the Eastern region should continue to focus on endogenous growth with the country’s Ministry of Land, Water, and the Environment outlining the changing nature of Morocco’s frontier regions. According to official ministerial notes, “the emergence of territories as actors of globalization signifies a profound change in the state of the spirit in actors of development regarding territories which are no longer seen as simple suppliers or receptacles of public or private assets, but as systems which they themselves produce.” Staying conscious of the region’s needs and paying mind to improving the system are essential for Oujda’s growth prospects.