EGYPT – Egypt has set a historical record for exporting dates to the Moroccan market, more than doubling its export volume to the country in the MY 2022/23.

From October 2022 to September 2023 (i.e., over 11 months of the past MY), 32,000 tons of dates were exported from Egypt to Morocco.

According to an East Fruit report, this volume is two and a half times as high as in the entire MY 2021/22, and twice as high as the average export volume for the previous four marketing years.

Following this rapid expansion, Egypt has also become the second largest date supplier to Morocco after India.

Moreover, unlike the previous season, Egyptian exporters managed to significantly extend their presence in the Moroccan market, setting records for shipments at its very beginning, from October to December.

“Morocco is the second largest date importer in the world, despite having quite serious volumes of its own production.” explains Yevhen Kuzin, Fruit & Vegetable Market Analyst.

“Moreover, dates for Morocco are the most important category of fruit and vegetable imports, accounting for almost a third of them in the value terms.”

Egypt, on the other hand, is the largest date producer in the world, so it is not surprising that trade in dates between the two countries is developing rapidly, added Kuzin.

Morocco is the largest export market for Egyptian dates. Other important importers of Egyptian products include Southeast Asian countries (Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam, etc.).

However, unlike Morocco, Egyptian dates appear on Southeast Asian markets a bit later and are mainly present from January to April.

In addition to Morocco and Southeast Asia, dates from Egypt are also supplied to Middle Eastern countries, Turkey, EU, and many other markets.

In another report published by FAO, African countries, including Morocco, accounted for about 40% of the global production of dates in 2021.

Nevertheless, Morocco has never been among the global leaders in exports of dates and even continues to increase their imports.

 

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