The partnership agreement is part of the common policy of the Tourism and Transport Ministry in order to promote the destination Morocco and to achieve the goals set out in “Vision 2010”. The two ministries are working on continuous coordination of the newly created hotel beds and new flight seats as well as the establishing the promotion of Moroccan destinations in the major European source markets. The partnership agreement results from the following policies:

1. The sales policy operated by the ONMT since 2003 in respect of the integrated tour operators (those that have their own aircraft fleets), in the bounds of which marketing plans will be implemented and jointly financed together with the key actors in the sales sector with which the Moroccan destinations will be promoted. In return for this, the tour operators will commit themselves to ambitious targets for the flight connections and the number of holidaymakers to Morocco.
2. The policy of liberalisation of air transport operated in Morocco since 2004, which was completed with the coming into force of the open sky agreement between Morocco and the European Union in December 2006. The open sky agreement is intended to open up big opportunities for airlines offering flights between Morocco and the European Union and in particular regular direct connections.

The partnership agreement, which is being concluded today with the globally leading tourism group, has a pan-European dimension. The TUI Group has a presence right across Europe and stands out through the integration of all tourism activities:

Tour Operating: 79 tour operators that are represented in 18 countries
· Flight: own airlines with a total of over 100 aircraft
· Hotel: 12 hotel chains in 28 countries with 285 hotels and over 163,000 beds
· Retail sales: network of over 3,500 travel agents
· Cruise holidays: 10 cruise ships
· Incoming agencies: 37 incoming agencies in 31 countries
The partnership agreement is concluded a month after the announcement of the possible merger of the TUI Group with the British group First Choice Holidays, the fourth largest tour operator in Europe. The merger, which would further strengthen the group’s position as world market leader in tourism and is presently being examined by the European anti-trust authorities, would bring about a new tourism giant with a turnover of €17.6bn and employing around 65,000 people.

The partnership agreement is also the continuation of an initial outline agreement that was concluded with TUI in July 2003 for 3 years. Thanks to the outline agreement, a big boost in turnover has been achieved on the markets that are strategically important to Morocco (France, Germany, Belgium and the UK). Moreover by establishing or expanding regular flight connections it has made a substantial contribution to the development of direct flights:

• Paris - Marrakech
• Paris - Fez
• Paris - Agadir
• Brussels - Agadir
• Brussels - Marrakech
• Brussels - Tangier
• Stuttgart / Hannover / Düsseldorf - Agadir
• London / Manchester – Agadir
• London / Marrakech

Thanks to the agreement, which is effective for the period 2003–2006, 256,000 holidaymakers came to Morocco in 2006 (compared to 100,000 guests in 2003). All in all, 635,000 holidaymakers came in three years (2004-2006). Since the flight capacity will have to be increased, the TUI Group created 266,000 flight seats for 2006 (2003: 118,000 seats).

The principles of the new partnership

The new partnership agreement, which is concluded with the TUI Group for a period of three years from November 2007, pursues even more ambitious goals. It affects more markets (9 instead of 4) and more Moroccan destinations (10 instead of 3).
 
The partnership agreement is the first agreement of its kind: pan-European, for several Moroccan destinations and along the entire tourism value creation chain with commitments relating to tourism services, investments in sales promotion and marketing as well as ambitious flight destinations.

This pan-European agreement therefore pursues two main goals in respect of the markets covered by the tour operator companies of the TUI Group:

· Strengthening of sales on the four most important markets to which the earlier partnership agreement related, especially through the planning of new flight connections and the promotion of destinations such as beach destinations under the umbrella of Plan Azur.

· Enlargement of the group of countries affected by the agreement to 9 markets: France, Germany, Belgium, the UK, but also Austria, the Netherlands, Poland, Scandinavia and Russia.
In relation to tourism destinations, the new agreement pursues the objectives:

· Contribution to advertising for beach destinations such as Tamuda Bay/Tetouan, Mogador, Lixus, Taghazout/Tamaouanza or Saidia and cultural destinations, such as Ouarzazate o Tanger.

· Strengthening of advertising for destinations like Marrakech, Agadir and Fez.

TUI undertakes to double the current number of holidaymakers to 517,000 guests by the end of 2010 (end of 2006: 256,000 visitors). This corresponds to an anticipated overall number of about 1.7 million holidaymakers in Morocco over four years (end of 2006 to end of 2010).

To achieve these figures, a flight capacity of over 600,000 will be needed. Of these, TUI will provide at least 400,000 seats on its own airlines by 2010 (end of 2006: 266.000 seats).

Within three months after signing the outline agreement at the Assises du Tourisme in Fez, there will be concluded with each subsidiary of the TUI Group implementation agreements in which the conditions for the partnership between Morocco and its subsidiary are set out.

Within the bounds of the partnership with the TUI Group, investment will be given an important position.

In addition to existing projects with a present capacity of 2,000 beds, the group will create an additional capacity of around 4,600 beds in the course of its current construction projects in Marrakech (Al Baraka) and Agadir (Robinson and Oumnia): that means roughly 7% of the capacity additionally planned for the period 2007–2010.

In addition to the current projects both partners have agreed to intensify their cooperation regarding investment and to investigate together any further potential for TUI to invest in hotels in Morocco.

Thanks to the new partnership agreement, Morocco should climb from 17th place (2006) in the rankings of TUI Group destinations, to the TOP 10 (2010).

Hotels in Morocco