(Ecofin Agency) - Morocco’s High Commission for Planning (HCP) published a study on the way households in the countries are living amid this pandemic. The study shows that 34% of families in the country have no source of income, with more than 31% - 54.2% of the middle class and qualified craftsmen being in the situation.

People who claim to have a source of income (38%) say the money is just enough to handle spending; 39% of them are in urban areas and 35% are in rural areas. Some families interviewed (22%) say they had to draw from their savings, 14% say they contracted debt and 8% live on government aid.

However, regarding the government support, HCP says that 60% of families whose members have lost their jobs have difficulty obtaining public assistance; 59% of them say they are already registered but have not obtained the funds yet.

Morocco has buried 192 people due to the pandemic (2.7% of the 6,939 confirmed cases) and the government announced an extension of lockdown measure until June 10 over the fear of new sources of contamination. This is yet another worrying news for the people most affected by the measure.

The issue with the loss of revenue and the extension of lockdown is that people will have even more difficulties to pay loans owed to banks. In the middle class, 28.2% of people are without any source of income and owe banks. In this scenario, banks have granted a moratorium on debt payment but this approach is going to have a huge impact on the result of the banking sector.

Idriss Linge