Morocco has officially transitioned from a state of water stress to one of scarcity, according to the Royal Institute for Strategic Studies (IRES). Access to drinking water, agricultural sustainability, and ecological balance are becoming uncertain, in a context where aquifers are depleting, reservoirs are draining, and rainfall is diminishing. The crisis is no longer temporary; it affects the very fundamentals of the development model.
Since the 1960s, the annual allocation of freshwater per capita has decreased by more than four times, dropping from 2,500 m³ to less than 600 m³. In many rural areas, households rely almost exclusively on groundwater, which supplies more than 90% of them. These reserves are rapidly weakening, as they are now replacing surface water, which itself is in significant decline.
Agriculture accounts for nearly 90% of water resource usage and remains the activity exerting the most pressure. Export-oriented irrigated crops, intensive use of agricultural inputs, and elevation expansion are weakening natural sources. The National Institute for Agronomic Research (INRA) estimates that 60 to 80% of wetlands have disappeared, diminishing the natural reservoirs that historically acted as buffers during droughts.
For several decades, the public response has focused on increasing supply, primarily through dams and hydraulic infrastructure. This model has enabled widespread access to potable water and the development of over two million hectares of irrigated land. However, today it is showing its limitations. Aquifers are no longer replenishing at the same rate, reservoirs are affected by irregular inflow, and planning suffers from a lack of consolidated data.
At the same time, institutions dedicated to water management exist but struggle to produce visible effects. Several mechanisms – the laws of 1995 and 2015, the High Council of Water and Climate, and the National Council for the Environment – are still awaiting stronger implementation and better coordination across territories.
The Moroccan crisis also occurs within a contrasting global context. Water covers the majority of the Earth’s surface, but the freshwater that can actually be mobilized remains limited, concentrated in a few countries like Canada, Russia, Brazil, or China. Furthermore, a third of the world’s population still lacks access to drinking water. In other regions, consumption exceeds 250 liters per day per person, while in sub-Saharan Africa, it often does not reach ten liters.
Morocco thus faces a strategic equation: to sustainably secure its supply, preserve agriculture, and avoid a social tipping point in the most vulnerable areas. Integrated resource management, territorial governance, and the acceleration of structural solutions – desalination, reuse, storage, and water transparency – will be the decisive considerations in the coming years. Without these measures, scarcity will cease to be an indicator and will become an irreversible threshold.