Food insecurity: Situation in Morocco is getting worse

Food insecurity is increasing in Morocco. This is according to a recently published United Nations report entitled “The 2022 Near East and North Africa Regional Overview of Food Security and Nutrition: Trade As An Enabler For Food Security And Nutrition”. Worse still! “The prevalence of moderate to severe food insecurity in the Kingdom has increased and reached 31.6% from 2019 to 2021 compared to 26.7% from 2014 to 2016”, says the UN report, drawn up by several organisations. Among them, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), the World Food Program (WFP), the World Health Organization (WHO), the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), and the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (ESCWA). In total, 11.7 million Moroccans suffered from moderate to severe food insecurity from 2019 to 2021 compared to 9.6 million during the 2017-2019 period. Nearly 3.6 million Moroccans were “seriously” exposed during the same period. The causes of this situation, say the experts of this study, would be linked to drought, the lack of rainfall, and its irregularity. This negatively impacted production. The Covid-19 health crisis has only made the situation worse. Admittedly, the country has developed several strategies to restructure the agricultural sector and achieve self-sufficiency. Launched in 2008, the Green Morocco Plan had very ambitious goals. However, the main achievements are mainly export-oriented. “This strategy succeeded in increasing agricultural shipments by 117%, which corresponds to 3.5 billion dollars”, say the experts in the report. In 2020, vegetable exports totaled 1,227,018 tons in 2020 versus 736,471 tons in 2010. The share of the agricultural sector in all exports represents 21%. The Generation Green 2020-2030 action plan thus makes up for the shortcomings of its predecessor to ensure food security. However, to achieve the expected goals, insists the UN report, Morocco must first “mitigate its vulnerability to climate change and periods of drought”.

Khadija SKALLI