Rabat – Images of hundreds of washed-up fish in the Oued Nfifikh [Arabic for Nfifikh Valley] located in Mohammedia have gone viral on Moroccan social media over the past days.
The local population and civil society have complained about the situation on social media and in interviews with national and local news outlets, noting how the bad smell and pollution have ruined the beautiful landscape.
Mohamed Sehmi, a local activist told Morocco’s TV channel 2M that “Mohammedia is going through an unprecedented environmental situation,” adding that “Oued Nfifikh suffers the ravages of pollution that is 90% caused by human beings.”
Sehmi associated the remaining causes with heatwaves and drought.
Explaining the causes of the phenomenon, Abdelmajid Sahraoui, President of Mohammedia’s Association of Teachers of Biology told TV channel SNRT News that the valley’s estuary was blocked by sand which caused water stagnation leading to a decrease in oxygen levels in the water and eventually the death of local marine life.
Sahraoui called upon Morocco’s Ministry of Water and Equipment to urgently address the issue of the blocked estuary by widening these access points connecting the valley to seawater.
Additionally, the Regional President of the National Organization for Human Rights and the Defense of Freedoms Driss Oughriss noted on August 1 that the “environmental disaster” seen in Mohammedia goes back to rising pollution in the area driven by the existence of “unlicensed sewage channels” and “illegal warehouses in the Bani Ikhlef area.”
Oughriss added that the National Organization for Human Rights and the Defense of Freedoms has previously reached out to the Minister of Water Equipment, national committees working on water and environmental issues, as well as local authorities, urging them to take immediate actions to address the phenomenon. Still, no action was taken to address the issue.
In June, a report quoted during a press conference by Morocco’s Minister of Energy Transition and Sustainable Development raised concerns about the decline in water and sand quality across the country.
The report noted that 80% of beach pollution results from onshore causes, with 88% of the waste consisting of plastic products. Cigarette butts came second as the most concentrated polluting substance on studied beaches, followed by candy sticks.
While Morocco banned the production and use of plastic bags in 2016, other forms of plastics such as packaging remain prominently used in Morocco.
Many of the plastic waste ends up on streets, valleys, rivers, and beaches.
Numerous Moroccan organizations have taken initiatives to address the issue by promoting recycling, transforming plastic waste into other products, and organizing beach clean-up campaigns.
