How can online payment enhance SME competitiveness? This question was at the heart of the sub-regional conference held in Casablanca on 21 February. The event was organized jointly by ITC and the Moroccan trade promotion organization, CMPE, and gathered participants from Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia. While Europe, with its tens of thousands of merchant websites, is fully exploiting the opportunities offered by online sales, developing countries and emerging economies' adoption of online transactions has been very timid, with only a few large companies engaging in such transactions.
The contribution of e-finance to SME productivity and competitiveness is tremendous. As emphasized by Maher Karoui, CEO of the Tunisian technical service provider HLP, and Ilham Montassir, CEO of Morocco's leading provider of online payment solutions, Maroc Télécommerce, online payment considerably reduces costs while increasing the speed of transactions. M. Chaibainou, head of Morocco's bankers association (GPBM), highlighted the potential of e-payment in terms of democratizing access to banks. Transparency gains were also mentioned by M. Carlo Cattani, international expert on finance and development. Still, greater sensitization efforts will be needed to ensure the buy-in of exporting SMEs of the region and convince them of the necessity of upgrading their business infrastructure and procedures accordingly.
The conference is part of a project that aims to analyse the current state of e-finance in Morocco and to design concrete measures to enhance SME competitiveness by leveraging e-finance. This initiative is part of the Mediterranean Finance for Trade programme funded by the Italian government. Its aim is to identify constraints and needs in the area of finance for trade in selected countries of the region, both in terms of traditional and innovative schemes, and to facilitate the transfer of experiences and good practices into the region. Furthermore, the project is destined to enhance and build up the capacities of trade support organizations, banking institutions and enterprises, through training and access to data as well as through information-sharing events.
- M. Labbe, M. Devolder, ITC Consultants ITC Project Reference INT/37/18A
Implementation: 17/7/2006 – 20/07/2008
Donor - Italy Contact M. Labbe, ITC (labbe@intracen.org), for more information
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