The Board of the African Development Bank Group has approved a €200 million financing package for Morocco’s Cap Compétences 2030 program, a results-based intervention designed to strengthen the relevance, quality, and diversification of the country’s vocational training offer. The program targets three structural weaknesses that have long constrained Morocco’s labor market: a mismatch between training outputs and employer needs, insufficient inclusion of youth and women in formal employment pathways, and limited use of digital tools in training delivery and job placement services.
The program is structured around three complementary pillars. The first covers skills development and strategic partnerships, strengthening cooperation between training institutions and private-sector operators to align curricula with real labor market demand. The second addresses inclusive training-to-employment pathways, improving mechanisms for bridging the gap between qualification and job placement, particularly for groups facing structural barriers to employment. The third pillar covers digital transformation of the training ecosystem, accompanied by institutional and operational capacity building across the agencies responsible for implementation.
Achraf Tarsim, the Bank’s Country Manager for Morocco, described the program as anchored in both Morocco’s National Employment Roadmap for 2025-2030 and in the AfDB Group’s Four Cardinal Points strategic framework. He emphasized the shared objective of harnessing Morocco’s demographic dividend as a driver of value creation and employment, with a particular focus on young people and women — the two segments where the gap between labor market potential and actual participation is widest.
The Bank’s intervention is designed to complement and reinforce support from other technical and financial partners working across Morocco’s employment and training system, with coordination mechanisms built into the program design to avoid duplication and maximize complementarity. The results-based financing structure ties disbursements to the achievement of pre-defined outcome targets, creating direct incentives for institutional performance and reform continuity.
Since its founding, the AfDB Group has mobilized more than €15 billion in Morocco across strategic sectors including education, health, employment, infrastructure, energy, and governance. The Cap Compétences 2030 program adds to a portfolio of operations focused on human capital development and structural labor market reform, and reflects the Bank’s long-term engagement with Morocco’s effort to translate sustained economic growth into broad-based employment gains.