Morocco Urban Transport Project (P4R)

The development objective of the Program-for-Results (PforR) Urban Transport Program Project for Morocco is to strengthen the capacity of urban transport institutions to plan, implement, and monitor infrastructure and services, and to improve the level of service of urban transport in targeted corridors in the program area. It will support the country partnership strategy (CPS) results area promoting competitive and inclusive growth by better linking citizens (including the poor, women, and people with limited mobility) to economic and employment opportunities in cities. The program will also support results area of the CPS, strengthening governance and institutions for improved services in several ways. The program will also support the World Bank Group strategic goals of ending extreme poverty and boosting shared prosperity in a sustainable manner, as well as the Bank’s recent Middle East and North Africa (MENA) strategy that was discussed by the Board of Directors on October 1st, 2015. The program will support the Bank strategic goals by easing access to jobs and economic opportunities for the bottom forty percent of the population (that heavily relies on public urban transport), thereby increasing their levels of income and reducing their transport expenditures. The program will also support the renewing the social contract pillar of the World Bank’s MENA strategy via the strengthening of the capacity of sector-specific institutions and the development of a program of expenditures that will ultimately result in an eased access to economic opportunities and social services to citizens (particularly the most vulnerable ones). The PforR builds on the recent urban transport development policy loan (DPL) approved in 2011. The PforR has been chosen as the most appropriate lending instrument for the following considerations: implementation support and results orientation; combining results on the ground and institutional reforms; and using country systems and...