The economic and social development of Morocco, in combination to the impacts of climate change, has increased considerably the water demand for urban and rural populations, industries, tourist establishments, as well as for agricultural uses.
In 2020, water demand in Morocco was estimated at 16.2 billion cubic meters (BCM) (including 1.7 BCM for drinking, tourism and industrial water supply). This demand is likely to increase further in the future and particularly under the impacts of climate change.
To address this urgent water demand problem, the EU funded Water and Environment Support (WES) project implements the Activity “Supporting water demand management related to water scarcity in Morocco” in order to support the Moroccan Ministry of Equipment and Water in advancing its Water Demand Management (WDM) efforts in the domestic, public and tourism sectors. As part of the implementation of this activity, a hybrid consultation workshop was organised, on the 23rd of June 2022, with the aim to present the findings of the first three tasks of the activity, namely the assessment of the status of implementation of water demand management in the country.
The WES water experts presented the results of the analysis of technical, legal, institutional, regulatory and financial aspects, identified gaps and challenges and made recommendations for potential technical, financial and institutional measures for appropriate short, medium and long term WDM approaches. These could increase water use efficiency in combination with related suitable communication and awareness raising efforts. Both WES and the stakeholders agreed on the methodology to be used to perform a benchmark of water consumption indicators in the uses concerned in Morocco; to help Morocco design WDM programs.
A sincere and productive dialogue took place among 37 representatives of the related ministerial departments, the agencies of hydraulic basin, the operators in the field of drinking, industrial and tourism water, and the Delegation of the European Union to the Kingdom of Morocco.
During the consultation, the need for the integration of the WDM sectoral policies was emphasized and it was agreed, that a multisectoral action plan for improvement of WDM in Morocco, including the roles of key actors in the implementation of WDM in the end uses concerned and in the collection of data and monitoring of WDM indicators should be prepared and developed under the fourth task of the activity.
