The annual report on the Economic Freedom Index for 2024, issued by the Canadian “Fraser Institute,” ranked the Kingdom of Morocco 90th globally out of 165 countries covered by the report, with a score of 6.46 out of 10.
This places Morocco first in the Maghreb region, improving by seven positions compared to the last report published by the institute.
The index is based on 45 criteria, distributed across five main areas: “Government Size,” “Legal System and Property Rights,” “Sound Money,” “International Trade Freedom,” and “Regulation.”
Countries are categorized into four groups, with Morocco in the third category alongside Tunisia and Mauritania, which ranked 118th and 120th, respectively. Libya and Algeria were classified in the group of countries with the lowest levels of economic freedom, ranking 157th and 161st, respectively.
In the “Government Size” category, Morocco received a score of 6.95, placing it 66th globally.
It ranked 70th worldwide in the “Legal System and Property Rights” category, with a score of 5.31. Morocco also achieved over six points out of ten in the “Sound Money” category, and over seven points in “International Trade Freedom,” resulting in a rank of 90 in this regard.
On the other hand, Hong Kong ranked first globally with a score of 8.58, followed by Singapore, Switzerland, New Zealand, Denmark, and the United States. In the Arab classification, the United Arab Emirates led with a rank of 45 globally, scoring 7.39, followed by Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar. In contrast, Venezuela ranked last at 165th with a score of 3.02, followed by Zimbabwe, Sudan, Syria, and Algeria in the lower ranks.
The report indicated that the average GDP per capita in countries with high levels of economic freedom exceeded $52,000 in 2022, while it did not surpass $6,968 in less free countries. It also noted that the infant mortality rate in these less free countries is about nine times higher compared to those with greater economic freedom.
Data from the Fraser Institute’s report on global economic freedom, which measures how policies and institutions in each country allow their citizens to make their own economic decisions, shows that only 1% of the population in areas with high economic freedom lives in extreme poverty (defined as living on less than $2.15 per day), while this figure is about 30% in less economically free areas.
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