Drought And 'Natural' Stress In The Southern Dra Valley
Varying Perceptions Among Nomads And Farmers

The Dra Valley consists of six oases stretching from the southern fringes of the High Atlas mountains to the Sahara. The area has been inhabited since early times by several groups and communities – Arabs and Berbers; nomads, farmers and traders; religious and lay groups; 'freemen', clients and slaves – differentiated according to various parameters, but integrated in complex socio-economic formations. This part of south-eastern Morocco, known in the pre-colonial past as a rich region in the heart of the trans-Saharan route linking Timbuktu with northern Africa, was affected by radical change during colonial times, but most of all in the first decades of independence. Nonetheless, till the mid-1970s, the almost exclusively rural population of the Dra Valley still seemed able to adapt locally to global economic transformations: traditional agriculture and herding still ensure the subsistence of both nomad and sedentary communities. The progressive deterioration of ecological conditions during the last two decades reached a drastic level in the mid-1990s, with grave consequences for economic production. For the various actors involved in the region in different ways – state agencies, development organisations, research institutions – the diagnosis is clear: drought is the major problem in Wadi Dra. The local population often agreed with this assumption, while applying complex strategies to overcome the severe effects of drought in their daily life.