Is self-entrepreneurship still attractive?

How would you assess the auto-entrepreneur scheme less than ten years after its launch? Exclusive figures obtained from the postal bank (Barid Al Maghrib) indicate that since its introduction just under ten years ago, 615,660 people have signed up to the self-employment scheme, of whom 389,565 are active. Just under 5,000 applications are currently under review.
The service sector accounts for the lion’s share of registrations, with 44%, followed by commercial activities (40%), industry (9%), and crafts (7%).
The surge in membership was recorded over the course of the Covid year, in particular 2020, when the number of registrations soared to 174,665. This figure is explained in particular by the economic and financial implications of the state of emergency due to the health crisis, with compulsory administrative closures and redundancies. According to figures from the High Commissioner’s Office for Planning (HCP), the national economy lost 432,000 jobs in 2020 (295,000 in rural areas and 137,000 in urban areas), compared with the creation of 165,000 jobs the previous year. This was due to the combined effect of the health crisis and the dry agricultural season, hence the use of self-entrepreneur status to create one’s own job, all the more so as this professional framework enables one to offer one’s services to several customers. On another note, 118,116 people have been deregistered.

One of the advantages of this status is the ability to work from home, without having to have a registered office or domicile. Of the 615,660 people who have adopted this system, 262,117 work from home, i.e. 42.25%. 12.52% carry out their activities in a store, and 7.05% on a building site. In terms of nationality, Moroccan nationals represent the overwhelming majority, around 98.3%, while foreigners account for barely 1.07% (10,437 people). In terms of periodicity, it should be noted that 554,155 auto-entrepreneurs operate on a permanent basis (89.32%), as opposed to 66,250 engaged in seasonal activities (10.68%). While 2020 saw a sharp rise in applications to join the national register of self-entrepreneurs, the pace began to slow from 2021 with 104,529 registrations, dropping to 73,519 in 2022, then 61,160 in 2023. For the first two months of 2024, the number of registrations stands at 3,820. Official registration statistics are not broken down by sector. Consequently, it is difficult to distinguish the share of service providers (who are in the majority) from those carrying out commercial, industrial, or craft activities. This breakdown is important, as the tax regime for service providers has been completely overhauled. This greatly reduces its attractiveness.

Hassan EL ARIF