HIBAPRESS – Rabat
The Agricultural Development Agency organized, on Thursday, the signing of six partnership agreements with groups of non-governmental organizations, with the aim of implementing projects concerning the accompaniment of small agricultural holdings in their transition towards ecological agriculture.
The Agricultural Development Agency said, in a statement that the HIBAPRESS newspaper received a copy of, that "ecological agriculture" falls within the "Revival" program within a national dynamic that aims to promote ecological agriculture and enhance the capacity of rural areas to adapt in the Fez-Meknes region, the Eastern region, and the Souss-Massa region.
It added that these areas, which depend heavily on agriculture, are suffering from the increasing effects of the deterioration of natural resources and climate change, and continued that the intensive farming methods currently adopted contribute to soil degradation, the loss of biodiversity, in addition to the challenges of managing water resources.
The agency went on to say that these problems are exacerbated by the shrinking agricultural workforce and the continuation of rural migration, which necessitates the adoption of integrated and sustainable solutions, adding that the program, supervised by the Agricultural Development Agency, aims to "support the transition towards a sustainable and environmentally friendly agricultural model."
It pointed out that the program has been allocated a financial envelope of 4 million euros in the form of a grant, with joint funding from the French Development Agency and the European Union, which will be implemented over three years, highlighting that the program is characterized by adopting an innovative and unprecedented approach, launched by the Ministry of Agriculture within the framework of the "Revival" program (Reviving Moroccan rural areas through employment and entrepreneurship in the agricultural and semi-agricultural sector, funded by the Agency for Agricultural Development and the European Union in support of the "Green Generation" strategy), through a special call for tenders to accompany small agricultural holdings in their transition towards ecological agriculture, in partnership with national and international non-governmental organizations."
According to the source, this approach aims to "strengthen the integration between national and international actors, mobilize financial and technical resources, and benefit from and value the experiences and expertise of the actors, making them an active force to support human development in the targeted rural areas," pointing out that the program "aims to transform 8,000 hectares towards ecological agriculture, improve the economic performance of 2,700 family agricultural holdings, and support the marketing of agricultural products extracted from ecological agriculture, as well as the adoption of ecological techniques by the benefiting farmers."
