Marrakech palm groves under threat

The famous Marrakech palm groves - once a magical oasis of flowers, animals and farmers - are shrinking as drought and development take their toll. According to Alfred de Montesquiou, writing in the Houston Chronicle, the impact of mass tourism and investment by jet-setters, Paris glitterati and some 16,000 other foreigners now with second homes in and around Marrakech, has been to increase some land prices by 100% in a decade.

Although the site is listed as World Heritage its swaying palms are yellowing and sickly, parched by drought that climate change experts predict may worsen as the planet warms. Here is an excerpt from Montesquiou's article.

Government-encouraged mass tourism, land developers, golf courses and rich Europeans' closed-off luxury villas are squeezing out farmers from the grove. For generations, farming families here lived almost in symbiosis with the palms, harvesting their fruit and shelter while tending to the trees. Most now have gone or been evicted, pushed out by lack of work or tourism driving land prices up.

The pace of destruction is staggering.

In 1929, Morocco's then-French rulers measured the palm grove at about 40,000 acres — an area nearly 50 times that of New York's Central Park. By 1998, it had declined to nearly 30,000 acres. Since then, the grove has shrunk by nearly half, to an estimated 16,000 to 19,000 acres. Water is a major problem, for both the trees and the people who have long lived under them.

Staggering prices

Marrakech has become a top tourism destination. Even small plots in the palm grove now fetch as much as $1.5 million, creating pressure to sell to promoters. "Even one century of cultivation couldn't match the price owners can get for their land," says Youssef Sfairi, head of a nongovernment group trying to preserve the grove. His association, Amal Palmeraie, would translate from French and Arabic as "Hope for the Palm Grove."

As a UNESCO heritage site, the grove is supposed to be protected by Morocco. Marrakech City Hall, Morocco's government and private partners have committed the equivalent of $13 million to replant 400,000 palm trees by 2012. The plan, launched by Morocco's King Mohammed VI and headed by one of his sisters, has already brought the number of palm trees from 100,000 in 2006 to over 260,000, but most of the new trees are being planted in touristic zones near Marrakech instead of throughout the palm grove.



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