Morocco’s road-freight sector sounded the alarm on 5 January after a surge in French Schengen-visa refusals left dozens of professional drivers grounded in North Africa. According to industry representatives quoted by media outlet Bladi, rejection rates at the French consulate in Rabat and its satellite TLS centres have spiked since October, disrupting regular shuttle runs that keep EU-Maghreb trade moving.
Transport unions report that complete files—including prior visas, invitation letters and route manifests—are being dismissed without explanation. Processing times for those lucky enough to secure appointments now exceed six weeks, up from 10 days a year ago. As a result, trucking firms have cancelled rotations to French and Spanish logistics parks, re-assigning scarce drivers to domestic work and eating penalty costs for missed delivery windows.
Independent logistics operators looking for immediate solutions may turn to specialist visa facilitators. VisaHQ, for instance, offers end-to-end support for French Schengen applications—from securing the earliest available appointment slots to double-checking supporting documents for professional drivers—via its dedicated France portal (https://www.visahq.com/france/). Leveraging such services can trim processing time and cut the risk of costly refusals.
![Visa Logjam at French Consulate Strands Moroccan Truckers, Threatening EU-Maghreb Supply Chains]()
The squeeze comes amid a seasonal uptick in agri-food exports bound for French supermarket chains. Cold-storage specialists warn that if the backlog is not cleared within a fortnight, perishable flows of citrus and early vegetables could default to airfreight—a much costlier mode that threatens price inflation in EU retail outlets.
For corporate mobility teams the case is a cautionary tale: even short-stay C-type visas can become chokepoints when consular capacity tightens. Companies moving staff between France and Morocco should book slots months in advance and consider applying for multi-entry visas via the Talent Passport or Intra-Corporate Transferee categories where possible.
Meanwhile, Moroccan authorities are lobbying Paris for an urgent visa-facilitation window for accredited drivers. If no relief comes, shippers may re-route via Italian or Portuguese ports, lengthening lead times and undermining France’s role as the primary gateway for Maghreb–EU overland trade.
Transport unions report that complete files—including prior visas, invitation letters and route manifests—are being dismissed without explanation. Processing times for those lucky enough to secure appointments now exceed six weeks, up from 10 days a year ago. As a result, trucking firms have cancelled rotations to French and Spanish logistics parks, re-assigning scarce drivers to domestic work and eating penalty costs for missed delivery windows.
Independent logistics operators looking for immediate solutions may turn to specialist visa facilitators. VisaHQ, for instance, offers end-to-end support for French Schengen applications—from securing the earliest available appointment slots to double-checking supporting documents for professional drivers—via its dedicated France portal (https://www.visahq.com/france/). Leveraging such services can trim processing time and cut the risk of costly refusals.
The squeeze comes amid a seasonal uptick in agri-food exports bound for French supermarket chains. Cold-storage specialists warn that if the backlog is not cleared within a fortnight, perishable flows of citrus and early vegetables could default to airfreight—a much costlier mode that threatens price inflation in EU retail outlets.
For corporate mobility teams the case is a cautionary tale: even short-stay C-type visas can become chokepoints when consular capacity tightens. Companies moving staff between France and Morocco should book slots months in advance and consider applying for multi-entry visas via the Talent Passport or Intra-Corporate Transferee categories where possible.
Meanwhile, Moroccan authorities are lobbying Paris for an urgent visa-facilitation window for accredited drivers. If no relief comes, shippers may re-route via Italian or Portuguese ports, lengthening lead times and undermining France’s role as the primary gateway for Maghreb–EU overland trade.
