MOROCCO– Morocco’s airport authority, Office National Des Aéroports (ONDA) has set out an ambitious target of increasing the country’s airport capacity to 60 million air passengers by 2025, a ministerial source told Moroccan news outlet Medias24.
In 2019, Morocco’s 18 international airports received approximately 25 million travelers.
But with new flights to Morocco every month, the National Office of Airports (ONDA) ambitiously hopes to achieve its new target.
Morocco’s airports currently have the capacity to receive approximately 40 million passengers, the source said.
However, 25 million is by far the highest far total passenger count that the country has been able to achieve.
In 2019, ONDA dramatically increased the capacity of the country’s busiest airport, Mohammed V International Airport in Casablanca, from 7 million to 14 million passengers.
The airport’s new terminal was sorely needed: Just days before the end of the year, Casablanca recorded its 10 millionth air passenger of the year.
But, the official said, ONDA does not plan to rest on its laurels now that it has increased Casablanca’s capacity.
On average, the number of air passengers in Morocco increases by 16% each year, making continual capacity-building an imperative.
Along with Casablanca, Marrakech (6 million passengers), Agadir (2 million passengers), and Rabat (1 million passengers) accounted for nearly 80% of air passenger arrivals in Morocco in 2019, according to ONDA figures.
In September 2019, the immigration authority also removed the requirement for all arriving passengers to fill out an entry form in order to speed up long lines at immigration and customs.
