The agreement with Morocco was designed to take into account the different levels of economic development by providing for an asymmetrical approach. While EFTA states lifted their tariffs and quantitative restrictions on imports or exports from Morocco and measures of equivalent effect when the agreement came into force, Morocco was allowed to allow them to expire for an extended transitional period, leaving time to adapt its economy to free trade conditions. This phase of operation is completed on December 1, 2011. In 2004, Morocco signed the Agadir Agreement with Jordan, Egypt and Tunisia. This has forced all parties to remove all tariffs on trade between them and to harmonize their legislation on customs standards and procedures. The Agadir agreement came into force in July 2006 and is implemented by the Agadir technical unit in Amman. The pan-Euro-Mediterranean cumulative system was introduced in 2005. It brings together the EU, Morocco and other European and Mediterranean partners to support regional integration through the creation of a common system of rules of origin. Rules of origin are the technical criteria for determining whether a particular product is eligible for duty-free access or other preferential access under a specific trade agreement. Beyond its status as one of the few African countries to have secured a free trade agreement with Washington and to be aware of the country`s central position between the United States and the EU (with which it also maintains privileged trade relations through a free trade agreement), the Moroccan government is somewhat grossomic with regard to free trade agreements and its own role in promoting it in Africa and the Arab world.

In addition, each EFTA state has a separate agreement with Morocco on agricultural products. These bilateral agreements are part of the instruments for the creation of the free trade area between the EFTA countries and Morocco. The overall aim of the negotiations is to create new trade and investment opportunities and to ensure better integration of the Moroccan economy into the EU internal market. The DCFTA also aims to support the economic reforms under way in Morocco and to bring Moroccan legislation closer to that of the EU in trade-related areas. The agreement is based on the principle of free movement of fish, but allows Morocco to maintain tariffs on imports or taxes of equivalent effect for a number of products during various transitional periods within the meaning of Schedule II of the agreement. The agreement contains a Protocol A on processed agricultural products, which sets out the current rules (price compensation system) in this area. The underlying principle is that the tariffs reflect the difference between the domestic price and the world price of the basic agricultural component of the product. The industrial component (transformation) is duty-free.

In accordance with the protocol, each country has a table showing the products for which it grants concessions to its partner countries. These concessions constitute a treatment that is no less favourable than that granted by the various countries to the COMMUNITY. As part of their Association Agreement, which came into force in March 2000, the EU and Morocco created a free trade area for the liberalisation of trade in both directions. They then developed the free trade agreement through an agreement on trade in agricultural, agri-food and fisheries products and a protocol establishing a bilateral dispute settlement mechanism, which came into force in 2012. The agreement contains provisions relating to the elimination of tariffs and other trade barriers, as well as other trade-related disciplines, such as competition rules, intellectual property protection, public procurement, state monopolies, subsidies, arbitration procedures and payments and transfers.