The Prize, awarded since 1994, is given by the Women's World Summit Foundation (WWSF), an international non-governmental organization working for women’s and children’s rights and the UN development agenda. The Prize honours women and women's groups around the world that display exceptional creativity, courage and commitment for improving the quality of life in rural communities.
Aziza is from Figuig, an oasis town in Morocco’s Eastern Region, where the IFAD/GEF-supported project is centred. Since childhood, she has been involved in community life for sustainable development in this remote area surrounded by rugged, mountainous wilderness.
The project area actually covers more than 3.5 million hectares, most of it highlands. It is a major pastoral region, with some 2 million head of small ruminant animals. Livestock production represents the backbone of the economy for the whole zone. It is still for the most part carried out extensively to enable the livestock to obtain most of their sustenance from the pastures. However, due to rangelands degradation exacerbated by climate change, the food requirements of the livestock are hardly met now.
Aziza has been working since 2009 with local communities to promote sustainable land management approaches. As the only female member of staff among the project trainers, she has been able to show to both female and male farmers the advantages of adopting best practices in land management.
Aziza knows very well the economic potential of the unique and fragile ecosystem in which she lives and she is devoted to protecting its natural resources. At the same time, her familiarity with the challenges that rural people face in the highlands gives her the ability to support people shifting away from traditional practices that are not sustainable, while engaging in alternative and more sustainable income generation activities.
Aziza adopts a participatory approach in all her development efforts. She involves the local community members in the design and implementation of all project activities and she has been able to create an atmosphere of trust with both women (from housewives to managers of cooperatives) and men (local chiefs, farmers, herders, government officials). This results in a deep sense of ownership – a key step towards a sustainable pastoralism that will continue well beyond the project duration.
By recognizing and awarding Aziza’s experience in enhancing the quality of rural life, the WWSF aims to attract international attention to rural poverty eradication and women’s empowerment issues.
The project works to increase the incomes and improve the living conditions of poor herders in the area. It strengthens the capacity of grass-roots organizations to adopt participatory approaches to improve rangelands, as well as to identify and manage investment opportunities in animal production systems. In addition, the grant from GEF specifically supports the introduction of technologies that aims to restore and regenerate degraded soils optimizing storage and use of rainwater.
One example of such technologies is the Vallerani system, a method based on the use of patented ploughs (Delfino and Treno) that create a system of ground pits to collect rain water and other organic material.
Another one is the use of the Zander product, a mixture of compound fungal strains which provides nutrients to the soil and significantly reduces irrigation needs by helping roots grow for reforestation activities.
These technologies, together with other sustainable land management interventions such as micro-dam construction, sylvo-pastoral improvement, sand dune fixation and rainwater harvesting, have been successfully implemented in three vast pilot sites of 35,000 ha each.
Source: IFAD