The decline in European demand is reshaping the balance of power among major textile sourcing hubs. Between January and May 2026, the European Union’s purchases of clothing and made-up textile articles from third countries reached €38.652 billion, down 11.9% year on year.
Import volumes fell by 6% to 2.732 million tonnes, while the average import value declined by 6.2% to €14.1 per kilogram.
The Eurostat report therefore points to a contraction that goes beyond a decline in volumes. The sharper drop in value also reflects pressure on prices and a shift in European purchasing toward lower-cost products.
Morocco has partly resisted this trend. European imports from the Kingdom reached €1.053 billion during the first five months of 2026, down 9%.
The decline remains significant but was smaller than that of the overall market. This relative resilience enabled Morocco to retain its position as the European Union’s eighth-largest supplier and increase its market share from 2.6% to 2.7%, representing a relative year-on-year increase of 3.3%.
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Morocco’s performance was driven less by the volumes shipped than by the value of the products sold. According to the report, EU import volumes from Morocco fell by 18.6% to 40,693 tonnes.
The decline was therefore twice as steep in volume as in value, indicating that the composition of Moroccan exports partly offset the fall in quantities.
The average value of Moroccan imports consequently reached €25.9 per kilogram, compared with €23.1 a year earlier, an increase of 11.8%.
Morocco ranked second among the EU’s 10 leading suppliers according to this indicator, behind Tunisia, whose average value stood at €29.8 per kilogram.
The gap with major Asian suppliers remains significant. The report puts the average value at €12.9 per kilogram for China and €13.4 for Bangladesh. Even Turkey, the European Union’s third-largest supplier by value, stood at €20.8 per kilogram.
Morocco is therefore not competing in the same segment as sourcing hubs built around large-scale production and low prices.
However, this difference alone is not sufficient to conclude that Morocco has automatically increased its industrial value added or manufacturers’ profit margins.
Clothing remains at the core of Morocco’s positioning
A closer look at categories 61 and 62, covering knitted and woven garments, provides an even clearer picture of Morocco’s positioning.
European imports in these two categories fell by 12.1% to €33.846 billion, while volumes declined by 8.2%. Their average value per kilogram dropped by 4.2% to €19.7.
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Imports from Morocco, meanwhile, reached €1.028 billion, down 9%. Volumes declined by the same proportion to 32,375 tonnes.
The average value therefore remained virtually stable at €31.7 per kilogram, up just 0.1% year on year.
The report once again ranks Morocco second among the 10 leading suppliers in terms of the average value of clothing imports, behind Tunisia at €38.3 per kilogram but ahead of Vietnam at €29.4 and Turkey at €28.1.
The stability of Moroccan prices at a time when the market average is declining is a stronger indicator than the increase recorded across all made-up textile articles.
The 11.8% rise in the overall average value should indeed be interpreted with caution. The near stability recorded in categories 61 and 62 suggests that part of this increase stems from a composition effect between clothing and other made-up textile articles.
The core of Morocco’s offering is not experiencing a generalized increase in prices but is managing to maintain its level of value amid the decline in European prices.
Greater resilience than Turkey
The comparison with Turkey, the report’s main focus, reinforces this assessment.
Turkey’s clothing and made-up textile exports to the European Union fell by 15.8% to €3.410 billion. Its market share declined from 9.2% to 8.8%, while volumes fell by 16.3%.
Morocco remains far behind Turkey in terms of scale, with its sales accounting for less than one-third of European imports from the country. Its relative trajectory, however, was more favorable over the period under review.
Morocco gained ground in a shrinking market, while Turkey lost market share despite a slight 0.6% increase in its average value per kilogram.
Competition within the Maghreb also remains close. European imports from Tunisia declined by only 4% to €999.9 million. Tunisia’s market share increased from 2.4% to 2.6%, compared with 2.7% for Morocco.
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Morocco therefore retains a slight advantage in terms of value and market share, although its neighbor posted stronger year-on-year resilience and a higher average value per kilogram.
Duty-free access is no longer enough
Trade arrangements provide important support but do not, on their own, offer protection from competition.
According to the report, Moroccan products enter the European Union duty-free under the Euro-Mediterranean Agreement and the EUR.1 certificate. Turkey, Tunisia, Vietnam, Bangladesh, Pakistan and Myanmar also benefit from duty-free access under different arrangements.
China nevertheless remains the EU’s leading supplier, with €11.679 billion in sales and a 30.2% market share, despite a standard 12% tariff.
Its position shows that preferential tariff treatment alone cannot offset differences in costs, capacity or production volumes.
Morocco’s advantage instead lies in the combination of favorable market access and its ability to maintain a high average value per kilogram.
The main challenge now is to turn this positioning into sustained market share gains without prolonging the decline in volumes.
A comparison with 2024, however, requires the year-on-year rebound to be viewed in perspective.
Between January and May 2024 and the same period in 2026, the value of European purchases from Morocco fell by 4.2%, from €1.099 billion to €1.053 billion. Its market share also remained slightly below the 2.8% recorded two years earlier.
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Volumes, however, have almost returned to their 2024 level, reaching 40,693 tonnes in 2026 compared with 40,719 tonnes two years earlier.
The recent contraction therefore appears to be as much a correction following the increase recorded in 2025 as a structural loss of commercial capacity.
Morocco has not escaped the decline in the European market, but it has defended its prices, gained a fraction of market share and maintained its position against far more powerful suppliers.
