Is Tobacco legal in Morocco?

Legal status

Legal for adults, with smoking banned in listed public places and tobacco advertising banned. The product is governed by loi n° 15-91 relative à l'interdiction de fumer et de faire de la publicité et de la propagande en faveur du tabac dans certains lieux, promulgated by dahir n° 1-91-112 of 26 June 1995 and published at Bulletin officiel 4318 of 2 August 1995, pages 542 and 543. Its article 1 provides « Sont considérés comme produits du tabac, au sens de la présente loi, les produits destinés à être fumés qu'ils soient constitués entièrement ou partiellement de tabac ». Its article 4 forbids smoking in « lieux publics », among them administrative offices and meeting rooms, hospitals and clinics, public transport outside smoking areas, theatres and cinemas, and teaching rooms, and article 7 bans tobacco advertising on broadcast media, in the press published in Morocco, in cultural venues and on the fronts of tobacco shops. The law as published in 1995 sets no minimum age for buying tobacco. Its alkaloid is a different row. « Nicotine et ses sels » is printed in tableau A, produits toxiques, both in the annex of the dahir of 2 December 1922 and in arrêté n° 171-66 of 11 March 1966, as published in 1966; the leaf, the plant and the manufactured product are named in neither. Arrêté 171-66 inscribes substances « ainsi que les préparations les contenant », but its lists are section II lists, for substances intended for human or veterinary medicine, and a cigarette sold for smoking is not a medicinal preparation; so the tableau A entry governs nicotine as a medicine or poison, and the narcotics dahir, which attaches to stupéfiants, reaches neither. This is a reading of the section II lists, for human and veterinary medicine; the section I lists for commerce, industry and agriculture, which article 1 of the 1922 dahir has made by joint arrêté, were not read. This is the law as published in 1995, read from the gazette page images on 3 October 2026.

Consequences if caught

Capital exposure: none. Loi 15-91, read from the page images of Bulletin officiel 4318 on 3 October 2026, provides no imprisonment at all; its penalties are fines. Conduct distinction. Buying, holding and smoking tobacco are lawful. Article 11 punishes « toute personne qui fume du tabac ou des produits du tabac dans les lieux où il est interdit de fumer » with a fine of 10 to 50 dirhams. Article 12 punishes advertising or propaganda for tobacco by the means listed in chapter III with a fine of 1.000 to 3.000 dirhams. Article 3 requires the warning « le tabac est dangereux pour la santé » on every packet and lets the administration seize a packet without it. The narcotics penalties of dahir portant loi 1-73-282 of 21 May 1974 do not reach tobacco: its articles 1, 2, 3, 4 and 8 attach to substances classified as stupéfiants or inscribed in tableau B, and tobacco is in no section II tableau, and is not classified as a stupéfiant in any list read. For comparison, the narcotics penalties that do not reach this row: Article 2 of dahir portant loi 1-73-282 punishes holding « les substances ou plantes classées comme stupéfiants » with five to ten years and a fine of 5.000 to 500.000 dirhams, Article 8 punishes their unlawful use with two months to one year, Article 11 requires confiscation of what was seized and Article 13 lets the court ban a foreign national for five to ten years, and all four apply only to a substance classified as a stupéfiant, which tobacco is not.

If prescribed or medical

Smoking tobacco is not a medicine question here and no prescription rule applies to it. Nicotine as a pharmaceutical substance sits in tableau A, the produits toxiques regime of the 1922 dahir, and that regime governs nicotine as a substance, not a cigarette.

Documentation

Loi n° 15-91, promulgated by dahir n° 1-91-112 of 27 moharrem 1416 (26 June 1995), was read in full from the page images of Bulletin officiel 4318 of 2 August 1995, pages 542 and 543: chapter I, articles 1 to 3, packaging; chapter II, articles 4 to 6, smoking in public places; chapter III, articles 7 to 10, advertising; chapter IV, articles 11 to 14, sanctions and entry into force six months after publication. A Ministry of Health legal database copy republished by tobaccocontrollaws.org gives the same reference. In 2008 the Chamber of Representatives was reported to have adopted a bill amending the law, raising the smoking fine and penalising sale to minors, and in 2022 a parliamentary group proposed adding a fine for sale to minors as a complement to loi 15-91. No promulgated amending law was found by searching in French and Arabic, but the gazette after 1995 was not swept issue by issue, so an amendment cannot be ruled out. The alkaloid was read separately: « Nicotine et ses sels » is in the tableau A annexed to the dahir of 2 December 1922, Bulletin officiel 534 of 16 January 1923, page 63, read from the page image, and in tableau A of arrêté n° 171-66, Bulletin officiel 2817 of 26 October 1966. Tobacco, tabac, Nicotiana and cigarette are in no entry of tableau B as replaced by arrêté n° 1850-96 in 1996, Bulletin officiel 4422, pages 713 to 716, and in none of tableaux A and C of 1966 as searched in an OCR text of every page. The narcotics dahir portant loi 1-73-282, Bulletin officiel 3214 of 5 June 1974, pages 928 and 929, enumerates no substance, and its articles 11 and 13 apply only to the offences it creates. Placement for tobacco: in no section II tableau; the product is governed by loi 15-91 as published in 1995, and its alkaloid nicotine is in tableau A. Tobacco is also in no entry of the 1971 Convention tableaux as printed at Bulletin officiel 3590 of 19 August 1981, page 404, as the live cell recorded on 22 September 2026.

Drug laws and enforcement change and vary within a country. This is not legal advice. Always confirm with Morocco’s embassy or official drug authority before traveling; penalties can be severe, including imprisonment.