This summer, brutally hot temperatures, deepening water scarcity, and spiking fertilizer costs have put North Africa’s agricultural sector under intense pressure. Host Alistair Taylor is joined by Mohammed Mahmoud, CEO and founder of the Climate and Water Initiative and lead for Middle East Climate and Water Policy at the United Nations University Institute for Water, Environment, and Health, to unpack the region’s food and water security challenges. Drawing on Mahmoud’s new report card on agricultural sustainability in North Africa, they explore the diverging picture across the region, why some countries have weathered the strain better than others, and what it will take to build a more resilient and secure food system.
Outlook for Sustainable Agriculture in North Africa: Report Card Assessment
This report assesses the future sustainability of agriculture across North Africa using a multidimensional approach that considers the dynamics of water, climate, land, and economics. To enable this assessment of sustainable agriculture across the region, the author evaluates water resources reliability, water use efficiency, agricultural land sustainability, and the food sector economy for Egypt, Sudan, Libya, Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco, and Mauritania, and provides recommendations for action.
When the Strait of Hormuz closed in March, fertilizer prices spiked within weeks, triggering a food security crisis across North Africa and the Sahel. Host Alistair Taylor is joined by MEI Senior Fellow Intissar Fakir to explore what it means for the region, unpack the link between food security and regional stability, and assess how the strait’s reopening could impact those affected.
Western Sahara: Self-Determination and International Law
Originally posted April 2008
The failure of the Kingdom of Morocco and the Polisario Front to agree on the modalities of the long-planned United Nations-sponsored referendum on the fate of Western Sahara, combined with a growing nonviolent resistance campaign within the territory against Morocco’s 31-year occupation, has led Morocco to propose granting the former Spanish colony special autonomous status within the kingdom.
Western Sahara (formerly Spanish Sahara) is the territory in northwestern Africa between Morocco and Mauritania bordering the Atlantic Ocean. The territory is also host to Africa’s longest-running territorial dispute. In April 2007, Morocco presented an autonomy plan for the territory to the United Nations. On the first anniversary of the proposal, this issue of Viewpoints critically examines the plan and its prospects for success.
Democratization in Morocco: Political Transition of a North African Kingdom
Mounia was in the midst of her PowerPoint presentation, held in the seminar room opposite the office of the Dean of the School of Humanities and Social Sciences (SHSS) at al-Akhawayn University in Ifrane (AUI). It was the last week of the Spring 2000 semester, the last meeting of the Capstone seminar on “Contemporary Morocco,” that Mounia, like all graduating seniors of the SHSS, had to pass in order to get her B.A.
The oldest peer-reviewed publication dedicated to the study of the modern Middle East, MEI’s flagship journal covers politics, society, and culture in the region.
