'We did not imagine it this bad:' Morocco under alarming water stress, warns Minister

 Minister of Equipment and Water, Nizar Baraka, shed light on Morocco’s dangerous water situation in a recent presentation underlining how Morocco reached a critical point after five consecutive years of drought.

Rainfall did not exceed 21 millimeters on average over the past three months, unveiled Baraka during the symposium that followed the government council on Thursday, stressing that there was a significant decline estimated at 67% compared to a normal year. 

The temperature was also high as Morocco exceeded the annual average during the three months, which had a major impact on evaporation and the condition of the dams.

The same minister explained that the dam’s capacity during the same period did not exceed 519 million cubic meters, while last year recorded one billion and 500 million cubic meters, meaning that the alarming decline reached two-thirds.

Regarding the areas concerned with this critical situation, the government official said that the Locus is the largest water reservoir in Morocco, and one of the areas that usually witness heavy rainfall, as the annual average of water entering the dams was 282 million cubic meters, but this year it did not exceed 23 million meters cube.

At the Moulouya level, the dams usually amass 311 million cubic meters, while this year’s filling rate did not exceed 121 mm3. 

As for Sebou, it used to welcome 758 million cubic meters, not exceeding 90 million this year. 

While the dam of Bouregreg usually welcomes 147 million cubic meters this season, it did not exceed 14 million this year. As for Oum Rbia, which usually received 694 million cubic meters, it hardly welcomed 195 million cubic meters.

The Souss-Massa region, known for recording about 160 million cubic meters every year, only reached 10 million cubic meters this year.

“We did not imagine that we would reach this point, which harmed the dam filling rate, which did not exceed 23.5%, with a decline of 7 points compared to last year,” the minister underlined.