Morocco’s National Ports Agency and the French Development Agency signed a joint declaration in Rabat on November 3, 2026, concerning a third financing package under their strategic partnership. Worth €100 million, the operation is intended to contribute to ANP’s investment program covering 2023-2030. It places port modernization and environmental transition at the center of a new stage in cooperation between the two institutions.
The announcement confirms financing that was described in October 2025 as covering eleven Atlantic ports. That earlier account already linked the planned operation to facility modernization, decarbonization and stronger climate resilience. Current reporting on the signing confirms the amount and identifies several locations for operations, but it does not publish the complete and final list of the eleven ports mentioned in the previous announcement.
A joint declaration signed in Rabat
The declaration was signed by ANP Director General Mustapha Farès and AFD Morocco Director Catherine Bonnaud. The ceremony took place in the presence of Nizar Baraka, Philippe Lalliot and Abdellatif Zaghnoun. These details establish the institutional setting of the announcement, although the reviewed sources do not specify how the financing will be divided among the different projects or locations that may ultimately benefit from it.
The scope of the instrument requires careful wording. Available information describes a joint declaration concerning the third financing package under the ANP-AFD partnership, with a total value of €100 million. It does not provide a complete disbursement schedule, procurement dates or completion deadlines. The declaration therefore confirms the financing framework without establishing that all the proposed works have started or that every component has a finalized implementation timetable.
A thirteen-year non-sovereign loan
The financing takes the form of a subsidized thirteen-year non-sovereign loan granted without a Moroccan state guarantee. This is an important feature of the announced structure. The arrangement connects the operation directly to the partnership between ANP and AFD while supporting the Moroccan agency’s port investment program for 2023-2030, within the limits of the components described by the sources available for the current announcement.
For readers, this structure helps distinguish the overall amount from future operational allocations. The €100 million represents the announced envelope, but no verified detail yet specifies the amount reserved for each port, each project or each of the financing package’s four axes. The priorities have therefore been identified, while their conversion into individual budgets, procurement procedures and implementation schedules remains to be confirmed through further project-level information.
Four modernization and transition priorities
The first axis covers the rehabilitation and reinforcement of port infrastructure. The second concerns renewable energy and the desalination of non-conventional water. The third supports the extension and modernization of fishing ports, while the fourth focuses on decarbonization and the electrification of quays. Taken together, these priorities connect infrastructure requirements with the energy, water and climate considerations identified within the broader port investment program.
Earlier ANP initiatives provide concrete context for some of these priorities without proving that they will be financed through the new package. The agency reported a renewable-energy-powered desalination station operating at Lamhiriz and a similarly powered demineralization station under construction at Tan-Tan. It also identified planned desalination stations at Laâyoune, Boujdour and Dakhla, showing how water and renewable-energy measures already feature in ANP’s wider activities.
Six named locations and a full list still pending
Current coverage names six Southern Province locations in connection with the operations: Tan-Tan, Tarfaya, Laâyoune, Boujdour, Dakhla and Lamhiriz. This establishes an explicit geographical scope, but the six locations should not be presented as the exhaustive beneficiary list. The figure of eleven ports comes from an earlier report about financing then expected in 2026, rather than from a detailed list released with the November signing.
This distinction prevents two levels of verified information from being conflated. The November declaration confirms the €100 million amount and names six locations, while the framing reported in October 2025 referred to eleven Atlantic ports. Until a complete list appears in the material available for review, the identities of any five additional ports, their precise projects and the respective shares that might be allocated to them cannot be established.
Climate resilience and the details still to come
Climate resilience is a central theme of the initiative. ANP identifies it as a strategic requirement for Moroccan ports and reports investments in oceanographic and climate-measurement systems. Separately, an AFD mission to fishing ports in Laâyoune, Boujdour and Dakhla identified blue-economy development, greener ports and infrastructure resilience as priorities for future financing, providing context for the environmental direction of the latest package.
The French ambassador also emphasized the economic importance of port infrastructure and the need to protect coastal facilities against sea-level rise and strong waves. The November 3 declaration now provides a financing framework aligned with those priorities. The next expected details concern the final port list, project-by-project allocations, implementation stages and deadlines, none of which are specified in the sources reviewed for the current announcement.
