LEDD issues in grazing land: Timahdit

Editor's note 14Jun2012: Text source D211, section 3.1.3

Nowadays, changes in landscape spatial structure due to human activities are a concern, especially for biodiversity conservation. Habitat conservation is affected by the human demand for housing, arable land, freshwater and manufacturing, increasing land degradation and climate change and consequently threatening ecosystem functioning rising the risk of further extinctions. Succession processes due to changes in land use are typical of rangeland ecosystems as a response to disturbance. For instance, during the last 50 years, the population in the Maghreb has increased considerably, leading to overexploitation of rangelands and desertification (Kebrom and Lars 2000; Olson et al. 2000; Alados et al. 2004).

In the Middle Atlas in Morocco, ecological integrity of the pastoral systems that sustained natural resources for long time, depended on mobility that relied on local land management institutions developed by locals to regulate land utilization (Benchrifa 1990; El Aich and Waterhouse 1999). Conversion of these areas into open access systems, when the local land management institutions changed, resulted in an increase in the use of the grazing areas. In addition, under demographic pressure and economic change, these systems are becoming more sedentary. Sedentarisation in the summer rangelands of the Ait Arfa du Guigou, where the LEDDRA study site is located, is a consequence of the breakdown in the double transhumance that regulated the use of land resources (Bourbouze 1999; El Aich and Waterhouse 1999). In the past, the double transhumance concerned the lowlands in winter and the highlands during summer. Conversion to agriculture of the lowlands reduced the grazing areas and caused a breakdown in the double transhumance.  Consequently, herders reduced their mobility and settled in the summer high grazing lands.  Herders started to continuously graze pastures that had previously been grazed on a seasonal basis. This change resulted in the invasion of pastures with species with low nutritional value; reduced the carrying capacity of these rangelands; reduced the diversity of pastures; increased the cost of meat production for producers as a result of the need to buy more feedstuff; prompted farmers to switch to different products, in particular crops with higher added value (potatoes and onions) and made the system more agro-pastoral rather than pastoral.

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