{"id":20991,"date":"2025-12-12T14:12:46","date_gmt":"2025-12-12T12:12:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jhb-webdevelopers\/channelafrica\/news\/afdb-lends-morocco-316-million-for-airport-upgrades-ahead-of-2030-fifa-world-cup\/"},"modified":"2026-02-27T16:32:10","modified_gmt":"2026-02-27T14:32:10","slug":"afdb-lends-morocco-316-million-for-airport-upgrades-ahead-of-2030-fifa-world-cup","status":"publish","type":"news","link":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/news\/afdb-lends-morocco-316-million-for-airport-upgrades-ahead-of-2030-fifa-world-cup\/","title":{"rendered":"AfDB lends Morocco $316 million for airport upgrades ahead of 2030 FIFA World Cup"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The African Development Bank (AfDB) said this Friday it would lend Morocco 270 million Euros ($316 million) to finance upgrades to the country&#8217;s airport infrastructure in time for hosting the 2030 FIFA World Cup.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Morocco plans to invest 38 billion Dirhams ($4 billion) to increase overall passenger capacity at its airports to 80 million by 2030, from 38 million currently, as it prepares for a surge in tourist arrivals ahead of the World Cup, which it will co-host with Spain and Portugal.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Morocco, Africa&#8217;s most visited country last year, has already set a new tourism record in 2025, reporting 18 million arrivals by November compared with 17.4 million for all of 2024.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>The loan will help expand passenger terminals and modernise equipment at airports in the key tourist hubs of Marrakech, Agadir, Tangier and Fez, AfDB said in a statement.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>The financing brings AfDB&#8217;s total commitments to Morocco this year to 1.3 billion euros, reinforcing the country&#8217;s position as the bank&#8217;s largest client.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Morocco is also expanding the fleet of its state-owned carrier Royal Air Maroc to strengthen its role as a regional hub, connecting Africa with Europe and the Americas through its Casablanca base.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&#8211;Reuters&#8211;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":20992,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false},"news-type":[78,20],"class_list":["post-20991","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","news-type-featured","news-type-sport","entry"],"acf":{"short_description":"AfDB lends Morocco $316 million for airport upgrades ahead of 2030 FIFA World Cup\n","published_date":"2025-12-12 16:11:27","news_description":"AfDB lends Morocco $316 million for airport upgrades ahead of 2030 FIFA World Cup","form_embed":"","author":"","image_caption":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/20991","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/20991\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24826,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/20991\/revisions\/24826"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20992"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20991"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"news-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-type?post=20991"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}