Adnane HABIB

ABSTRACT A Middle Jurassic site at Tafaytour area (Argana Basin, Morocco) with trackways of six large sauropod dinosaurs is regarded as having high scientific and touristic value. The new dinosaur track site is extremely vulnerable, and suffers from continuous degradation caused by weathering and human activity. Documentation and protection of this tracksite is still a necessity for its integration into local geotourism activities, where it may have a socio-economic impact on the local population. Taking into consideration many similar tracksites, and strata of great paleontological interest in Morocco, including the Tafaytour tracksite, the implementation of legislation for the protection of Morocco's geological heritage, especially the paleoichnological heritage, to protect against destruction, is strongly recommended. This is necessary to cement geoheritage impact, both for scientific reasons and to value add to the socio-economic activities of the local people.

La région de Bab Taza – Amtrass constitue un secteur de choix pour un essai de cartographie des phénomènes de mouvements de versant. Cela implique en premier lieu un levé cartographique permettant de dresser un inventaire des mouvements de versant de la zone d’étude, afin de répertorier et analyser les mouvements présents dans le secteur étudié, puis la constitution d’une base de données géoréférée et connectée à un SIG intégrant les informations recueillies sur chaque mouvement. Cette approche débouche finalement sur la réalisation d’une carte de localisation de mouvements de versant à l’échelle 1/10.000 servant à évaluer le risque d'endommagement et de coupure du tronçon étudié de la RN2.

In the Sahel of Abda-Doukkala, the advance of salt water intrusion related to the over exploitation of groundwater and to the coastal degradation is a major problem in this region, where groundwater is the only water supply resources. Consequently, several hydrogeological investigations were started in this region to ensure a good water supply for local people, agriculture and industry. In this work, several techniques for extracting lineaments were applied to ALOS and LANDSAT datasets in the central Sahel (between Sidi-Moussa and Oualidia), including different types of enhancement, and the application of different directional filters on PCA products derived from the original images. The extracted lineaments were evaluated through the published geological and hydrogeological maps for the study area, using GIS overlay operations. Statistical analyses were also performed to determine the length, density of lineaments. This new documents generated will allow a better understanding of the relationship fracturing - water circulation, and identification of areas of recharge and mineralization, and also allow the orientation of the hydrogeological exploration in this area; and this aims will be object of the next publication.

"Efficient water use is the key for sustainable management of water resources. The major reason of non-efficient management of water resources is non availability of reliable hydrological information about the actual water used by different agricultural crops with in a large irrigation system. Therefore, an estimation of spatially distributed crop water consumption is important and challenging to determine water balance at different scales to promote efficient management of water resources. Agriculture in Morocco’s Doukkala region is of great importance for national food production. The irrigated area of Doukkala is among the largest and earliest developed areas in Morocco, remarkable for its size and strategic importance for the national production, especially for sugar beet (38%) and wheat (20%). However, increasing numbers of droughts are limiting the supply of water and affecting productivity. Addressing this issue, a scientific activity is developed to implement a system that uses satellite data to estimate the amount of water actually needed by crops. The objective of the work is to assist the ORMVAD (Regional Office of Agricultural Development of Doukkala) in their project of reconversion of irrigation systems from gravitational to drip. The research consists to determine the crop water requirement (CWR) for increase efficiency in the use of water. Combination of spot data, meteorological and agronomical data was used to produce maps of CWR. For this, two approaches (FAO-56 model and Analytical Approach) were followed to establish the crop coefficient (KC) and crop evapotranspiration (Etc), parameters required for the production de maps of CWR.
In this study, SPOT images chosen during a drought year (1994), a normal year (2005) and a wet year (2008), has allowed us to track the evolution of the various parameters needed. The Comparison between the CWR and water allocation given to farmers, show that the water allocations are much higher than the CWR while the satisfaction rate of irrigated waters does not exceed 50%. This is due to the loss of water by evaporation from the soil related to the use of the gravitational technique of irrigation in a semi-arid climate.
The resulting maps are proving instrumental in optimizing the use of scarce water resources for irrigation, protecting the farmers from losing their harvests to drought. In the future the methodology should be developed by the introduction of additional parameters and data, and applied to the pilot areas, taking into account the type of crop (winter crop: wheat, the summer harvest and throughout the year, sugar beet)."

"Le Rif par sa complexité géologique, géomorphologique, topographique et par le caractère violent des précipitations qu’il connait, est considéré comme le siège des mouvements de versants au Maroc. Ces mouvements ont un impact non négligeable sur l’ensemble du réseau routier, qui est soumis à des dégradations fréquentes. Ce qui nécessite un entretien régulier souvent onéreux et chères, pour préserver le réseau en bonne état. La province de Chefchaouen vient couronnée les provinces du nord par la gravité et la fréquence des mouvements et en particulier la RN2, reliant Tétouan et El Hoceima. Face à une telle situation, la mise en place de structures et mesures capables d’exercer une prévention durable et efficace des dangers naturels est nécessaire. Identifier les phénomènes dangereux et déterminer leur localisation sont la condition préalable à toute action de prévention.
La cartographie des mouvements de versants dans la région Bab Taza-Amtrass, est l’une des études de base qui peuvent être réalisées dans le domaine. Cela implique en premier lieu un levé cartographique permettant de dresser un inventaire des mouvements de versants de la région d’étude, qui va recenser pour l’ensemble de la région ces mouvements, en indiquant leur répartition géographique, leur extension en surface, de même que leur degré d’activité et le niveau de dommages que connait la RN2, afin de répertorier et analyser les mouvements présents dans le secteur étudié, puis la constitution d’une base de donnés géoréférée et connecté à un SIG intégrant les informations recueillis sur chaque mouvement. Cette approche débouche finalement sur la réalisation d’une carte de localisation de mouvements de versants à l’échelle 1/10.000 servant à évaluer le risque de coupure du tronçon étudié de la RN2.