Gender mainstreaming in Morocco's water sector: From national strategies to oasis farming realities

Abstract

Gender mainstreaming in the water sector has gained increasing attention in international and national governance frameworks, yet its translation into meaningful change for women and in gender relations more broadly, in a context where both institutional arrangements and accelerating climate change are intensifying challenges around water access, control, use, and governance, remains a persistent challenge. This report examines this gap in the Moroccan context, focusing on two complementary entry points: an overview of gender mainstreaming efforts and institutional advances in the water and irrigation sectors; and the everyday realities of women farmers and cooperative members in the oasis regions of Boudnib and the Drâa Valley. Combining document analysis and institutional interviews with in-depth fieldwork, the study asks whether and how national gender mainstreaming commitments translate into tangible shifts in women's water access, livelihoods, and decision-making power on the ground. The findings point to a more nuanced picture. Morocco has made genuine institutional progress: gender is now formally embedded in constitutional principles, water law, sectoral strategies, and national planning instruments, and donor-financed irrigation projects have demonstrated that integrated gender approaches can yield concrete results. Yet these gains remain fragile, often conditional on external support or on the commitment of individual champions within institutions, a dependence that poses significant risks to their sustainability. Outside donor-supported projects, gender analysis is often absent from programme design, and formal inclusion, such as in land programmes, cooperatives, or training schemes, does not automatically translate into effective control over water, labour, or decisions. Many adaptive initiatives are shaped as much by women's own agency as by the institutional programmes formally available to support them, whose reach remains uneven and frequently contingent on literacy, mobility, and institutional connections. Deeper structural constraints, including historical exclusion from water governance bodies, the growing individualisation of groundwater access, and socio-cultural norms that limit women's recognition as farmers and irrigators, remain insufficiently taken into account by current approaches. The report concludes with five recommendations calling for stronger institutional anchoring, cross-sectoral coordination, reformed empowerment indicators, and a gradual reduction of dependence on donor financing.