Morocco is not proposing fewer environmental priorities. It is proposing a more coherent way to deliver them.

Through the MedProgramme, national institutions generated inventories, technical studies, management tools, pilot approaches and investment experience across pollution, wastewater, coastal management, water security, fisheries, biodiversity and climate adaptation. Morocco has now identified 31 actions that could carry this work forward.

The challenge is that these pressures do not operate as 31 separate problems. Pollution affects water and ecosystems. Groundwater management influences agriculture, energy use and coastal resilience. Biodiversity protection is closely linked to fisheries, livelihoods and climate adaptation.

Morocco’s emerging Replication Atlas responds by reorganising the 31 actions into three integrated programmes. The proposed structure would bring related priorities under common governance, national policy frameworks, measurable indicators and longer-term financing.

As Morocco’s representative explained at the Fourth MedProgramme Annual Stocktaking Meeting in Tunis, “The ambition is not to reduce the scope, but to increase the coherence and impact.”

The approach reflects a central lesson from implementation. Morocco participated in nine MedProgramme project components and reported 13 synergies among them. The next phase is therefore not about preserving every activity as a separate project. It is about converting experience across the portfolio into programmes capable of delivering coordinated action.

The Atlas currently groups the country’s priorities into three potential programmes: pollution, chemicals, waste and wastewater modernisation; integrated coastal resilience and replication of the Water, Energy, Food and Ecosystems (WEFE) Nexus; and marine biodiversity, ecosystem services and Blue Carbon.

These are working packages for national validation. They are not yet approved programmes or secured investments. Their value lies in providing a clearer structure for deciding what should move forward, under whose leadership and with what preparation.

Connecting pollution prevention, monitoring and treatment

Morocco’s first proposed programme would connect pollution monitoring, hazardous chemicals management, waste systems and wastewater investment.

The technical foundations are substantial. MedProgramme-supported work included national inventories of perfluorooctane sulfonic acid (PFOS) in firefighting foams and hexabromocyclododecane (HBCD) in polystyrene. Field investigations, laboratory analysis, stakeholder consultations and regulatory assessments strengthened national understanding of persistent organic pollutants and supported preparation of a prevention action plan.

Morocco now proposes extending detection and management protocols to PFOS, per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) and other emerging pollutants. Other priorities include strengthening the national land-based pollution-monitoring network, improving laboratory capacity and continuing work on polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), mercury, obsolete chemicals and hazardous waste.

These measures could be linked to wastewater treatment, reuse and investment preparation. Existing experience includes wastewater recycling in Guelmim-Oued Noun and advanced treatment for reuse at the Nador West Med port complex. Morocco has also proposed adapting modernisation approaches, including Environmental Technology Transfer for Climate Change (ENVITECC), to selected coastal pollution hotspots.

The opportunity is broader than replicating individual treatment facilities. It is to create a coordinated programme that links monitoring, prevention, regulation, treatment, reuse, digital reporting and investment, allowing Morocco to address the pollution pathway as a whole.

Managing coastal territories as connected systems

The second proposed programme would combine coastal governance, water security, climate resilience and the WEFE Nexus.

Morocco has already developed important foundations in the Tanger-Tétouan-Al Hoceima region. Integrated coastal planning, the Regional Coastal Scheme, participatory climate work and the Rhiss-Nekkor coastal-aquifer management model have helped reveal how groundwater, surface water, marine ecosystems, agriculture and territorial development interact.

The Replication Atlas proposes using this experience to support priority action emerging from the Regional Coastal Scheme, extend integrated coastal planning to other regions and apply the WEFE Nexus through new territorial pilots. It also identifies opportunities to adapt the Rhiss-Nekkor approach to other priority coastal aquifers.

This is not simply a proposal to reproduce technical methods elsewhere. It is an attempt to preserve the relationships that made the original work useful.

Coastal water security cannot be addressed through groundwater management alone. It also depends on surface water, agriculture, energy, wastewater, ecosystem health and territorial development. Organising these priorities as one programme would allow institutions to assess trade-offs together, coordinate responsibilities and direct finance towards interventions that deliver benefits across several sectors.

The investment pathway still requires further preparation. National institutions must connect environmental priorities with feasibility work, financial decision-making, possible guarantees and co-financing. Any final investment scale will depend on how the proposed interventions mature.

Making ecosystem value part of economic planning

The third programme would connect marine biodiversity, fisheries, ecosystem restoration, ecosystem services and Blue Carbon.

Morocco proposes strengthening scientific monitoring of priority species, mapping the vulnerability of sensitive marine areas, restoring degraded coastal ecosystems and integrating ecosystem-service values into planning and investment decisions.

The country can build on work through the FishEBM Med project, which supports preparation of a National Action Plan Plus linking fisheries management, biodiversity protection and the blue economy. A national coordination mechanism is also intended to bring together environmental and fisheries authorities, local stakeholders, civil society and private-sector actors.

A proposed pilot on collecting and recycling end-of-life fishing gear could add a practical circular-economy dimension and test how local organisations and women’s cooperatives can contribute to reducing marine litter.

The most forward-looking proposal is a national marine Blue Carbon initiative connected to Article 6 of the Paris Agreement. The concept includes an interministerial working group, a national roadmap linked to Morocco’s Nationally Determined Contribution, a monitoring, reporting and verification system for coastal ecosystems, studies of Mediterranean lagoons and Posidonia seagrass meadows, institutional capacity development and engagement with international partners.

This is not yet a financed carbon project. It is a structured national concept connecting ecosystem restoration, climate adaptation, scientific measurement and potential carbon finance.

Its strategic importance lies in positioning healthy ecosystems not only as environmental assets, but also as foundations for resilience, fisheries, livelihoods and future investment.

Morocco’s next decision

Morocco has already defined the organising principle for the next phase. The remaining task is national validation.

For each proposed programme, national institutions will need to confirm the lead authority, participating partners, priority locations, first implementation or investment action, monitoring framework and remaining preparation needs.

They must also distinguish between interventions ready to advance and those still requiring feasibility studies, economic valuation, institutional agreement or financial structuring.

Morocco’s representative described the intended transition as moving “from knowledge to action, from isolated initiatives to integrated impact”.

That is the central value of Morocco’s Replication Atlas. It retains the country’s 31 priorities while giving them a common direction. Instead of advancing dozens of separate projects, Morocco is creating a structure through which related actions can reinforce one another.

Morocco is not reducing its environmental ambition. It is reorganising that ambition into programmes that institutions can govern, partners can support and investors can understand.

The next generation of environmental action will not be built by multiplying isolated projects. It will be built by connecting them.