The future of agriculture in the high Atlas mountains of morocco: The need to integrate traditional ecological knowledge

Abstract

The High Atlas Mountains in Morocco as other mountains throughout the world are landscape providing major economic resources and ecosystem services. Mountain systems represent one-fifth of the world’s land and are home to 570 million people. Mountain zones are also important suppliers of water, food, hydroelectricity, timber, other mineral resources and biological diversity, increasingly vulnerable to climate change. As precipitation in Morocco is expected to reduce by 5 % in mountainous areas and 30 % in the southern regions of the country for the period between 2011 and 2050, water as a prime commodity will be greatly affected by these changes. Water shortage is in turn likely to alter agricultural production.