작성일자: 2013.6.18

작성자: 카사블랑카 무역관 허밝음, Anouar Kalim (kalimtra@yahoo.com)

 

 

1. Dar Assikkah: Government authority in charge of the banknote business

 

 ○ DAR AS-Sikkah is the banknotes and security documents printing Plant of the Central Bank of Morocco for the production and issuance of currency.

 

 ○ Bank Al-Maghrib has the privilege of issuing banknotes and coins in the Kingdom of Morocco. To fulfill this important function, Bank Al-Maghrib established Dar As-Sikkah in 1987. Thanks to this industrial unit, Bank Al-Maghrib designs, manufactures and ensures the issuing of Moroccan banknotes and coins. It then supplies its branches which in turn supply banking institutions, the Treasury and the Post. The issuing of new banknote or coin models is decided by Bank Al-Maghrib.

 

 ○ The denominations, formats, stickers, colors and other banknote characteristics, as well as those of coins (denominations, compounds, weight and dimensions) also are within its remit.

 

 ○ The central bank is the unique authority responsible for assessing and defining the quality of banknotes and coins in circulation. Those that do not meet the required conditions are withdrawn from circulation. Through Dar As-Sikkah, Bank AlMaghrib also ensures the printing of passports and other secure documents for the general government.

 

 

2. Annual issuing amount

 

 ○ Annually, DAR AS-Sikkah, the money making plant in Morocco, makes 550 million banknotes and 100 million coins. The institution also has to ensure the production and printing of passports (1 million per year) and other secure documents. At the end of 2010, 2.1 billion pieces were outstanding, 25% of which are 1MAD coins. In value terms, this is equivalent to 2.36 billion MAD. As for bank notes, they represent 150 billion MAD. The coins in circulation at the end of 2010 were 2.1 billion for a total value of 2.36 billion MAD.

 

 ○ Dar As-Sikkah, made during the year 2010, 900 million banknotes and manufactured and customized a million passports.

 

 

3. Other necessary information for International market advance on this country

 

 ○ Since its inauguration on March 5th 1987, Dar As-Sikkah has kept its business growing. It is specifically responsible for maintaining the quality of currency in circulation, centralization and monitoring of cash foreign banknotes and production of secure documents.

 

 ○ Dar As-Sikkah gathers experience and unique know-how in Morocco in the areas of design of banknotes and security documents, security printing, minting coins, processing and packaging currency and transporting funds.

 

 ○ In any case, Dar As-Sikkah seems convinced of the relevance and usefulness to confer increased resistance to the banknotes.  Is the reason why cuts of some notes such as 50MAD will undergo some changes that will affect their chemical composition to make them less vulnerable to external attacks.

 

 

4. Profile and contact information of reliable company

 

 ○ DAR AS-SIKKAH

  - Contact person: Mr. Mehdaoui Hamid

  - Address: Km 8,5 Route de Salé à Mekhnès - B.P. 445 - RABAT - MAROC

  - Telephone: + 037 81 80 00
                 : + 037 81 81 50

  - Fax: + 212 37 83 16 41

  - Email 1: darassikkah@bkam.gov.ma

  - Email 2: h.mehdaoui@bkam.ma

 

 

5. Case of Import of banknote, coin, banknote paper and security paper

 

□ Suppliers are required by contractual obligations and are somehow ‘old friends’ and worthy of confidence. The raw material as soon as it is landed is transported under high escort and any arrival is checked systematically in order to avoid any defect.

 

□ Thus, paper money comes in reams of predefined size that will lead to the production of 35 to 40 tickets each by type(20, 50, 100 or 200 MAD). Each paper is carefully scrutinized to verify the existence of the security thread and the watermark image of the Sovereign, then to verify that the ultraviolet rays to ensure that the items not visible to the naked eye are embedded in the paper material. For paper, it is 100% cotton made, much more durable than paper made from cellulose, which would degrade very quickly. For two years, notes of 20 and 50 MAD which are most subject to use, contain some plastic that allows them to withstand many manipulations.

 

□ The equipments and raw materials (metals, paper and ink) are supplied by specialists who deal with the States only. Money paper, alloy for coins are only provided to States and cannot be sold to individuals or private companies. This is a very secure system where only few players operate and are subjected to stringent specifications.

 

□ The selection of suppliers takes place in two phases:

 

 ○ Screening phase: where each candidate must bid according to the specification and articles of the tender.

 

 ○ Selection phase: Each preset applicant is invited to submit files under sections of the Rules of screening, within 60 days from the date of notification of the screening decision. The approval decision is notified by delegating the successful applicant within 60 days after receipt of applications.

     Once approved, the applicant shall have 30 days from the date of notification of the approval decision to sign the management convention.

 

□ Louisenthal vs. Arjowiggins

 

 ○ Two large internationally renowned in the field of manufacture of security paper companies were vying to win the international tenders launched by Dar As-Sikkah. It is the French Arjowiggins and German Louisenthal. Louisenthal employs approximately 9,000 employees worldwide and has a turnover of 1,500 million euros per year. According to the representative of the company, it invests 100 billion in research and development. “The new paper that Morocco has acquired is one of the fruits of this research policy. Dar As-Sikkah is our customer for over 20 years, it is very demanding in terms of quality and safety.”

 

 ○ The French company Arjowiggins is also a supplier of Dar As-Sikkah since 1987. It achieves a turnover of 2 billion per year and employs more than 7,700 people worldwide. The group has existed for five centuries and operates from 200 years in the field of manufacture of banknotes. Like its German rival, the French Arjowiggins developing substrates of high durability as Biguard concept of treating notes to protect them against bacteria and fungi. Moreover, this is the company that provided the substrates of the new notes of 50 MAD.

 

 

6. Banknote

 

□ Case of Import

 

 ○ After the inspection of the paper, comes the stage of verification of the physical properties of paper. Folds, double folds, threshold, tensile strength and tear resistance are carried out for each batch.

 

 ○ Along with this procedure, and always on the banknote, the laboratory in Dar Assikah also verifies compliance of inks used to print the notes. These are not normal inks, it must be said, and suppliers can be counted on the fingers of one hand.

 

 ○ The production of a banknote in morocco costs around 0.3 and 0.4 MAD. Dar Assikah produces annually around 550 million and half of the circulating banknotes in Morocco are collected every year in order to be sorted, controlled and if necessary destroyed.

 

 ○ This procedure guaranties the quality of banknotes and mainly its authenticity. For 20 and 50 MAD notes they are automatically destroyed because they are much used than other notes. The 10 TPS and 2 Toshiba machines in Dar Assikah reject between 2 to 5% of 100 and 200MAD notes sorted. In 2009, 19,000 notes counterfeit banknotes were sorted.

 

 

□ Specification of Products

 

Value	Dimensions (㎜)	Main Colour	Date of issue
20 dirhams	140 × 70	Violet	2005
50 dirhams	147 × 70	Green	2002
100 dirhams	150 × 78	Brown	2002
200 dirhams	158 × 78	Blue	2002

 

 

7. Coin

 

□ Case of Import

 

 ○ Coins are received as raw product, that is to say, without any engraving. These are just metal disks with no monetary value. These materials are received at the laboratory of Dar As-Sikkah for strict control as specified in the specifications to test its strength. Each batch delivered to Dar Assikah is a subject to checking the dimensions and surface smoothness before proceeding to composition test. A spectrometer is able to give information on metals that form the alloy delivered and their proportions. The coins are made from high-strength metal alloys. For silver coins, they are a mixture of copper and nickel(cupronickel) that is used, while the bronze aluminum provides the basic material of the silver coins, two alloys used in the composition of two-tone pieces are those of 5 and 10 MAD. Machines produce 750 coins per minutes. Once coins are etched, they go feed the packaging line and will meet with cylindrical packages of 10, 20 or 50. To ensure that packets are perfectly uniform, they are automatically weighed and the machine will reject any underweight or overweight package.

 

 

□ Specification of Products

 

 

 

8. Banknote paper

 

 ○ The paper used for the manufacture of banknotes is a special paper. It is based on cotton fiber 100%, which gives it a strong resistance to the hazards of daily movement. Dar Assikah uses paper with improved resistance for 20 and 50 MAD notes.

 

 ○ CEO of Dar As-Sikkah Abdullah Maamri clarifies in a daily newspaper(Le Matin) that suppliers of banknote paper are few and that the German company was selected in 2008 following an international tender. "For all our supplies, we play competition. For this operation, there were two competing size, German Louisenthal and French Arjowiggins” he adds.

             

 

 

9. Security Documents (Security paper)

 

 ○ Besides making money, Dar Assikah also produces secure documents as well as specific objects. The most common are the passports which started since 2001. Dar Assikah produced in 2009, one million passports. The car stickers are also the subject of design and manufacturing. The order placed by the Revenue Control covered 1.5 million units for the year 2010. This department also acquired 30 to 40 million tax stamps each year. Note that the manufacturing activity of national identity cards is no longer the responsibility of Dar Assikah since the transition to electronic document, a market that has been entrusted to the company Thales, three years ago. In their old version of laminated paper, these cards were produced at a rate of 1.5 to 3 million units per year. Tickets to enter to sports and cultural manifestations are also produced in Dar Assikah as well as national team football matches and tickets for athletic meetings.