The Algerian-Moroccan feud has made headlines due to the Algerian decision to cut all diplomatic ties with its neighbor in the summer of 2021. Although not surprising considering decades of tension-building and mutual provocations by both states, this decision’s consequences are far-reaching. This article offers to assess the cost of the Algerian-Moroccan conflict on the region’s economies and peoples.
The prosperity of Maghrebi economies is surely, although indirectly, affected by the Algerian-Moroccan feud. According to a 2010 World Bank prospective report, economic integration in the Maghreb could have increased per capita GDP between 2005 and 2015 by 34% for Algeria, 27% for Morocco and 24% for Tunisia. The United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) estimates that an integrated Maghreb union would have boosted its five countries’ economies by the equivalent of 5% of their combined GDP.
Even within the African continent, the Maghreb is the worst performing trading bloc. According to a 2019 report by the African Development Bank (ADB), intra-Maghreb trade is performing poorly compared to the continent’s other Regional Economic Communities (RECs). It was limited to 2.7% of the foreign trade of countries of the Arab Maghreb Union (AMU) in 2017, by contrast to 3.1% in 2016 and an average of 3.2% over the period 2012-2017.
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