As the most vulnerable agricultural regions face soil degradation, water stress, and increasingly visible impacts of climate change, a new dynamic is beginning to take shape. The Ministry of Agriculture, through the Agricultural Development Agency (ADA), is initiating an agroecological shift aimed at providing small farms with a more sustainable and profitable model.
At the core of this strategy, six agreements have just been signed in Rabat with consortia of Moroccan and international NGOs. This unprecedented alliance is designed to support farmers in Fès-Meknès, the Oriental region, and Souss-Massa in a transition that goes beyond the adoption of new techniques, aiming to entirely rethink the relationship with natural resources.
This initiative is part of the IHYAE program, dedicated to revitalizing rural areas through agricultural employment and entrepreneurship. Funded with 4 million euros—a grant co-financed by the European Union and the French Development Agency—it will unfold over three years. The dual ambition is to reduce the vulnerability of rural areas to environmental risks and to consolidate the incomes of the most exposed farming families.
The chosen approach marks a break from conventional practices. Intensive agriculture, which has long driven sector growth, is now reaching its limits: impoverished soils, declining biodiversity, a decreasing rural workforce, and increased pressure on water resources. Agroecology thus appears as a systemic response, capable of providing better resource management and a sustainable economic gain for family farms.
To enhance impact on the ground, the ADA has opted for an open Call for Projects aimed at NGOs, betting on the complementarity of expertise and the pooling of resources. This cooperation is expected to capitalize on existing experiences, accelerate the transfer of best practices, and create a genuine collective action force in service of farmers.
The goals are ambitious: to convert 8,000 hectares to agroecological practices, improve the economic performance of nearly 2,700 small farms, and structure the marketing of products derived from these new methods. A major challenge will also be to achieve a high adoption rate of the introduced techniques, which is essential for ensuring the long-term sustainability of this transition in the territories.
With this program, Morocco affirms a strategic orientation: to make agroecology not only a tool for climate adaptation but also a lever for economic development for the thousands of small farms that form the backbone of rural life.