In spite of its many assets (young, educated population, little extreme poverty and available natural resources), this region faces increasingly significant social and ecological pressures, which challenge the methods for medium and long-term development. IRD has been working around the Mediterranean since 1957 and has 4 representatives there today.
IRD’s work in the Mediterranean primarily concerns water resources, terrestrial and coastal ecosystems, natural risks, the living conditions and mobility conditions of populations, and questions of governance.
The regional meeting of IRD representatives in the Mediterranean took place on 30 November in Tunis. This meeting, organised by IRD to define its strategy in the Mediterranean, was an opportunity to take stock of IRD’s research and training actions, and it allowed IRD to define its major scientific and partnership directions in the region, in service of the SDGs.
Following the “General Assembly of research and training on gender in Morocco”, held in 2015, IRD worked alongside UNESCO and the University of Hassan II Casablanca to produce a summary work in 2018: “Gender and university in Morocco”. This work provides a review of gender equality (which is one of the State’s priorities in Morocco), analysing the issues and the outlook.
The PHYTOMET JEAI, launched in 2018 with the Faculty of Sciences at Mohammed V University in Rabat, studies the capacity of certain plants to tolerate and accumulate heavy metals, with the aim of developing rehabilitation methods and of ensuring this new scientific expertise is put to practical use.
The ALTOS project (Managing water resources within Mediterranean agrosystems by accounting for spatial structures and connectivities) has received funding of €1.1 million. This project is based on long-standing IRD partnerships in Morocco, Tunisia and Lebanon.