Only 31% of Moroccan companies have access to Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) and have an official website, while 69% have not created a website in 2019, according to the High Commission for Planning’s recent data published on February 1.
The percentage of companies with websites in the country is lower than the percentages in Turkey (59%), France (70%), and Germany (89%) respectively.
Companies in Morocco have good internet connectivity, with access rates averaging 81% on average for very small businesses (VSB), 97.9% for small and medium-sized enterprises (SME), and 99.5% for large enterprises in 2019.
92% of companies in Morocco mainly use the internet to access emails.
The usage of other features is even less common, with 38% of companies not accessing and editing documents, and 59% of companies not utilizing specialized professional software.
The HCP said Moroccan companies remain conservative in their exchanges because more than half of them thought ICT integration in human resources management was weak when interacting with public administrations, suppliers, and customers.
In the digital world, these companies are more likely to be young companies, having been established for less than 10 years or so, while companies with over 20 years of existence have been especially reliant on ICT for managing their exchanges with suppliers, customers, and government agencies as well as their human resources management operations and business development, HCP said.
Companies are also using external IT services less frequently, with only 20% using these types of services to store their information in 2019, while 18% are hosting their databases on the cloud.
The share of companies that purchased IT services using financial or accounting management software was limited to 26% and did not exceed 16% for customer relationship management (CRM) software.
Additionally, 6 out of 7 companies did not recruit in the pre-COVID-19 period, due to a shortage of ICT specialists.
During the period 2016-2018, 86% of companies did not recruit ICT specialists.
14% of companies reported recruitment difficulties, in addition to high salary requirements, the instability of these profiles in the job market, and the lack of certain qualifications were the main constraints to hiring in terms of ICT.
In order to respond to the circumstances of the COVID-19 pandemic, few organizations relied on their own staff to develop and support IT solutions.
HCP said the use of ICT has intensified since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020, especially during the total lockdown.
Public administrations were increasingly using digital platforms in order to respond to Moroccan users’ needs.
For private companies, motivations for investment in ICT and digital transformation strategies during the COVID-19 period remained different depending on each company’s activity sector.
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