Mapping land use competition in the rural–urban fringe and future perspectives on land policies: A case study of Meknès (Morocco)

Land Use Policy 47 (2015) 373–381

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Land Use Policy journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/landusepol

Mapping land use competition in the rural–urban fringe and future perspectives on land policies: A case study of Meknès (Morocco) Marta Debolini a,∗ , Elodie Valette b , Marie Franc¸ois b , Jean-Pierre Chéry c a b c

INRA, UMR1114 EMMAH, Domaine St. Paul, Site Agroparc, 84914 Avignon cedex 9, France CIRAD, UMR TETIS, Maison de la Télédétection, 500 rue Jean-Franc¸ois Breton, TA C-91/MTD, F-34398 Montpellier Cedex 5, France AgroParisTech, UMR TETIS, Maison de la Télédétection, 500 rue Jean-Franc¸ois Breton, F-34000 Montpellier, France

a r t i c l e

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Article history: Received 13 May 2014 Received in revised form 5 January 2015 Accepted 21 January 2015 Keywords: Vulnerability to urbanization Land use planning Peri-urban areas Spatial multi-criteria analysis GIS-MCDA Spatial explicit indicators

a b s t r a c t The geographical and socio-economic characteristics of peri-urban areas make them particularly vulnerable to land use competition. They are transitional zones, in continuous transformation, where various economic activities attempt to co-exist in equilibrium. Peri-urban agriculture plays a key role in this dynamic, functioning in a complex system that includes a large and diverse set of stakeholders which act to provide environmental and economic services to cities. The work described in this paper was undertaken to develop a methodology to map land use competition in terms of vulnerability to urbanization of agricultural lands, based on explicit spatial indicators set up in a GIS-based multi-criteria analysis (hereafter GIS-MCDA). The applied indicators are generated from an analysis of existing drivers of land use competition within the peri-urban area of Meknes (Morocco). This area is particularly interesting because of its agricultural characteristics, and because of recent changes in the dynamics of land use and tenure. This case study indicates a high risk of land competition in 37% of the area examined, and a very high risk in 16% of the area. The highest risk areas are located in the southern part of the peri-urban region, which is also considered the most valuable in terms of agricultural production. The map we have developed can be considered a preliminary tool for improving new planning strategies to manage land resource competition in rural–urban fringe zones. The approach presented is particularly useful as a simplified methodology to obtain spatialized indicators for the drivers of land use competition when data are limited, as often found in developing countries. © 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction Mediterranean countries are strongly characterized by their urban population growth: in 2011, two thirds of Mediterranean inhabitants already lived in urban areas (Houpin, 2011), and growth continues at a rapid rate, particularly in the southern side of the Mediterranean which has an annual growth rate of 4.3% (Veron, 2007). Augmenting and securing the food supply is an important issue among these growing urban populations, particularly in countries suffering agricultural deficits, most notably in cereal production (Fraser et al., 2013). Since the most productive croplands are situated on plains that are equally suitable for urbanization, this process often occurs at the expense of agricultural production and strains the plans designed to guide and contain growth, particularly in the developing countries. The result is a

∗ Corresponding author. Tel.: +33 04 32722386. E-mail address: [email protected] (M. Debolini). http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.landusepol.2015.01.035 0264-8377/© 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

fragmentation of natural areas, urban sprawl, and conflicts over access to natural resources (Brueckner, 2000; Jongman, 2002; Zavala and Burkey, 1997). In addition to the worrisome issues of global warming and climate change, these agro-ecosystems in periurban areas also face the growing scarcity of basic resources such as water and fertile soil, adding to the challenge of urban food security (Asseng et al., 2011). More recently, Zdruli (2014) calculates that approximately 7% of agricultural land will have been consumed by urbanization and land degradation in the Mediterranean basin over a 60 year period from 1961 to 2020. This loss would be particularly noticeable in North-African and Middle Eastern countries that are particularly vulnerable to these issues. At the same time, these peri-urban agricultural lands maintain the quality of natural resources within the city, and constitute a primary source of income for the inhabitants (FAO, 2011; Zasada, 2011; Eriksen-Hamel and Danso, 2010). Moreover, urban and peri-urban agriculture (hereafter UPA) plays a multifunctional role by providing food and other secondary ecological and economic services to the city (Zasada, 2011).

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Morocco, like many of the developing countries, is experiencing significant urbanization and urban growth, creating serious land-use competition, especially between housing and agricultural demands. Between 1982 and 2004, the rural population grew by 13% (from approximately 11.5 million to approximately 13.5 million) whereas the urban population almost doubled, passing from almost 9 million to more than 16 million (Haut-Commissariat au Plan du Royaume du Maroc, 2010). Meanwhile, according to the General Census of Population and Housing (1994), the rate of urbanization was almost 43% in 1982, and it exceeded 55% in 2004. The total area of agricultural land consumed by urbanization is estimated to be almost 90,000 ha by 2025, with an average rate of around 4500 ha per year (INAU, 2005). In spite of devices and regulations designed to manage urbanism, such as the law 12-90 which recommends the safeguarding of the land with high agricultural value, these agricultural regions are threatened by strong urban pressure. This geographical and socio-economical complexity makes the interface between urban and agricultural areas a primary battle zone for land use competition (Russwurm, 1980; Michelot, 1990; Torre and Caron, 2002), and the region’s exposure to impacts from current and potential climate change (Karrouk, 2007) only complicate the issues. In general, land use competition can rise out of the competition for resources among different stakeholders (or different interest groups) (Hessel et al., 1975), many examples of which are presented in related literature (e.g. Klopatek et al., 1979; García-Ruiz and Lasanta-Martínez, 1993; Hilson, 2002). These competition highlight the need for new development strategies and planning models that integrate the classical methodologies traditionally applied in urban planning with the management of agricultural activities (FAO, 2011; Redwood, 2009; Mougeot, 2000; Allen, 2003). There has been a progressive increase in interest from researchers and policy makers in the analysis and improvement of specific and integrated planning tools geared for the issues surrounding the rural–urban fringe. Berry and Plaut (1978) highlight the direct and indirect impact of urbanization on agricultural activities both at national, regional, and local levels, and they identify some possible tools to maintain farming activities confronted with the urbanization processes in the US. Page (1979) analyses a case study of the London urban fringe, where he assesses a decrease in the cereal yield as corresponding directly to the distances from the urban area. Entire studies developed in this field in the 1970s and the 1980s start underlining the strategic relevance of specific tools for land use planning in this zone considered to be critically vulnerable to the conflicts (Russwurm, 1980). Analyses of land use competition in peri-urban areas began to integrate not only urbanization but also the higher level of complexity caused by the co-existing presence of multiple functions and interests on these lands. The first studies in this field also underline how land use conflicts can play a role in defining new management practices (Michelot, 1990). Caron and Torre (2006) consider geographical proximity to be a factor, and in some cases the main source of conflict or tension in rural and peri-urban areas issues. Various tools have been developed to deal with land competition in planning strategies. Von der Dunk et al. (2011) tried to define a series of land use conflict typologies in peri-urban areas, to help orchestrate land use planning, whereas Alessa et al. (2008) identified and localized pivotal socio-ecological issues. Most of the applied tools are spatially explicit and the main output is represented by a synthetic map to facilitate the understanding and the applicability for policy makers (Brody et al., 2004; Brown and Raymond, 2014). At the same time, these studies did not produce an explicit mapping of vulnerability to land use competition, because there is not a determined and shared methodology to identify effective competition indicators and to map them. GIS-MCDA is a set

of methodologies applied to help decision makers in cases of complex choices that imply different spatial factors and spatial decision problems. It has been applied in different types of research in order to analyze the suitability or the vulnerability of spatial questions, considering different possible choices and groups of stakeholders with conflicting interests (Brody et al., 2006; Passuello et al., 2012). Recently, this methodology has been successfully applied to urban planning studies (e.g. Coutinho-Rodrigues et al., 2011). For this study, we conducted field research to collect data which allow us to create a map of land use competition in the subject area, based on the identification of a series of spatially explicit indicators set up in a GIS-MCDA. This methodological approach can be considered as a reference for studies under conditions presenting little data for the spatial analysis. The critical analysis of the current dynamics and strategies, and the map of land use competition are proposed as decision support tools for addressing future public policies in spatial planning. 2. Material and method We carried out this research as part of a contribution to aid local planning efforts in peri-urban areas seeking to avoid potential conflicts in land use. The research was conducted in three main phases. First of all, we characterize land competition drivers in terms of vulnerability to urbanization in the rural–urban fringe. This is done through an analysis of existing strategies in land management by farmers, institutions and real-estate stakeholders, and existing land dynamics and planning tools. This phase was developed using three methodological tools: (1) a series of interviews of farmers and policy makers, (2) a collection of existing documents about planning and management strategies and (3) an assessment of recent land cover changes through multi-temporal analysis of satellite images. We then turned these land competition drivers into spatial explicit indicators. These indicators were used as an input for a GIS-MCDA to obtain a synthetic map of potential stakes. These combined methods were meant to create information within a context of minimal data, and to collect information about sociopolitical factors that are not usually spatially explicit (Debolini et al., 2013). This approach allows for better integration of stakeholders’ perceptions as we develop a decision support tool for future public policies. The overall scheme of this methodology is presented in Fig. 1. 2.1. Study area The province of Meknes is part of the Meknes-Tafilalet region (79,277 km2 , approx. 2 million inhabitants), and is found in the center of northern Morocco (Fig. 2). Meknes has long been known as a “garden city”, and owes its reputation to the especially prosperous surrounding agriculture (Davis, 2006). Located in the center of the Saïs plain, one of the most fertile areas in Morocco, the city lies at the foot of the Middle Atlas of Moulouya mountains. The average rainfall ranges from 400 to 600 mm/year and the climate is defined as Mediterranean semi-continental, with temperate, rainy winters and warm, dry summers. The urban and peri-urban area of Meknes and its adjacent municipalities, encompass approximately 31,900 ha of agricultural land, including around 3600 ha that lie within the urban perimeter. Of this total surface, around 10% is irrigated (Abdouh et al., 2004). The main agricultural products are winter cereals and traditional arboriculture. In recent years there has also been a strong increase in olives grown for oil production. Winter cereals occupy around 77% of the total utilized agricultural area (hereafter UAA), whereas vegetable crops and fruit plantations represent 13.2% and 27.7% of the UAA (Abdouh et al., 2004).

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Fig. 1. Overall scheme of the methodology

Like many of the southern Mediterranean cities, Meknes’ urban form corresponds to what Leontidou calls “the Inverse-Burgess spatial pattern” (Leontidou, 2009), characterized by a compact cityscape, and a socio-spatial segregation between the wealthy class in the center and the poor on the periphery. Meknes’ urban expansion from independence though the late 1990s followed a path of spontaneous urban development, informal (slums), and illegal settlements in the suburbs with very little urban planning or at least little enforcement of any that existed (Mechkouri, 2011). In 2004, a “Cities without Slums” program was launched throughout Morocco to address a pervasive lack of social housing, and lead to the eradication of slums and the development of housing construction programs involving public and private sector partners. In Meknes, a majority of the urban growth is a result of these social housing programs that were built on the periphery of the city, and now even exceed the housing needs of the population. Urbanization rates between 1994 and 2007 list roughly 58

thousand new residences, authorized in the urban area of Meknes (Ministère de l’habitat et Inspection Régionale de Meknès, 2009). The Observatoire Régional de l’Habitat (2008) highlighted a shift between housing needs and housing construction. In 2004 the housing demand in urban districts of Meknes was estimated at 25,084 units. Between 2005 and 2007, the number of residences authorized in the area exceeded 35,500 units including 31,000 units in the urban municipalities. Actual construction in Meknes and the adjacent municipalities produced 20,761 new residences between 2005 and 2007, at an average of 6920 units per year, an increase of 12% in the 3 years. Therefore urban expansion in Meknes cannot be considered as true urban sprawl that is generally associated with low density and land consuming development with distinct geographic areas dedicated to work, homes, schools, and shopping (Staley, 1999). In spite of the development of a few housing developments disconnected from roads and amenities, urban growth primarily follows

Fig. 2. Study area

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the path of large public housing programs (80% public lead) that provide a mix of social housing, shops, and services along with row or semi-detached housing designed for the middle class.

The first stage of research concentrated on the analysis of local administration documents, reports and publications related to spatial planning in the study area. We focused on the analysis of (1) public policies in housing, agriculture and land, and on their impact on land use in the urban fringe, and of (2) local spatial planning documents, such as the city-region strategic Master plan called SDAU (Schéma directeur d’Aménagement urbain) and the binding zoning plan called PA (Plan d’Aménagement). The Master plan determines long-term goals of urban development, and sets guidelines for the location of residential or industrial activities, settlements, and infrastructures, and for the preservation of croplands in the urban fringe. The zoning plan determines the exact location for each type of land use.

image at resolution of 2.5 m). An object-oriented classification was developed (Herold and Scepan, 2003) in order to create a land use map from the acquired images. The resulting maps have a resolution of 10 m. The classification considers nine land use classes: arboriculture, winter cereal cultures, horticulture and forages, urban areas, forest, bare soil, rivers and other internal waters, urban vegetation (recreational areas, gardens), and unclassified. For the most part, this last class covers military zones that are widespread in the study area. In addition to determining the initial classification, we conducted a validation process to verify the preliminary results. During a 1 week mission in the field, a series of 260 control points were evaluated throughout the peri-urban area of Meknes. The comparison between the preliminary results and the on-site determination of actual land use allowed the correction of errors in classification. An evaluation of the accuracy of land use maps was conducted using the confusion matrix, which showed an overall precision of 91% on the land use mapping. A detailed description of this work phase is presented in Valette et al. (2013).

2.3. Stakeholders interviews

2.5. Identification of land competition drivers in peri-urban areas

Three series of interviews were conducted: (1) farmers, (2) policy makers and local authorities, and (3) representatives of the main building companies acting in the area. Farmers from agrarian cooperatives were particularly relevant for this series of interviews because of the recent dynamics involving cooperative terrains affected by land tenure reform involving privatization. The interviews were semi-structured and collected a range of information: general data about the farm (e.g. origin, development, and land tenure typology), production systems, relationships with the city, production and management dynamics, and visions of the future. 21 farmers and 8 cooperative leaders were interviewed, from 8 of the cooperatives in the peri-urban area of Meknes. The specific objective of this series of surveys was to characterize the productive structure of the study area and to understand which factors could improve the farms’ sustainability and keep farmers involved in the primary production system instead of abandoning agricultural activity. We conducted in-depth interviews with civil servants of the principle administrative structures that deal with land management and agriculture (Agence Urbaine, Inspection régionale de l’Habitat et de l’Urbanisme, Centre d’Investissement Régional, Direction Provinciale de l’Agriculture, Wilaya (Moroccan Prefecture) of Meknès). We also took into consideration real-estate promoters operating in Meknes by conducting interviews with the employees or technicians of Al Omrane and ALPIM (Association des Lotisseurs et Promoteurs Immobiliers de Meknès – an association of subdivision development and real-estate promoters in Meknes). The objective of these interviews was to understand the perspective and the activity of each actor with respect to his institutional or noninstitutional position.

With data from the previous steps we were able to identify the main drivers of land use competition in the study area. According to existing literature (Harvey and Pilgrim, 2011; Darly and Torre, 2013; Torre et al., 2014), we can distinguish three types of determinant factors: economic, socio-political, and environmental.

2.2. Spatial planning document analysis

2.4. Land use change assessment The goal of this step was to produce land use maps and evaluate land use changes (LUCs) which have occurred in the study area over the last 10 years. This analysis identified and mapped concentrations of LUCs that have caused significant land transformation in the study area. To produce comparable land use maps from different periods we applied a remote sensing tool. In particular, we acquired two series of images from SPOT (Système Pour l’Observation de la Terre) satellite imagery: the first one from spring 2001 (multispectral image at resolution of 20 m and a panchromatic image at resolution of 10 m) and the second one from spring 2011 (multispectral image at resolution of 10 m and a panchromatic

2.6. Socio-political drivers The analysis of planning documents suggests two main drivers of land use changes related to public policies in the study area: privatization of land and dispensation laws. First of all, land tenure acts as one of the main drivers by orienting the extension of the city and shaping growth patterns. The complexity of the Moroccan land tenure system remains particularly interesting on this regard. In Morocco there are currently three types of land tenure: private (melk), State, and collective (including guich, habous and cooperatives from the agrarian reform) landholding. Cooperatives in particular, come from land reform realized in 1972 by the Moroccan government that allocates State owned agricultural lands (Dahir no 1.72.277 29th December 1972) to groups of farmers. The total surface of agricultural reform cooperative in Morocco was around 303,000 ha. These areas were assigned to more than 20,000 farmers organized in 671 cooperatives (Sriri, 2011). These lands came largely from the confiscation of colonial possessions after Moroccan independence in 1956. In the early 1990s a clear trend emerged in Morocco advocating the privatization of state, collective, and religious orders’ (guich) landholdings (Taleb, 1998), that resulted in a streamlined process of private land registration which made ownership widely accessible to farmers. The Moroccan government promotes this privatization, embracing the liberal theory suggesting that private property is one of the best ways to reduce poverty in developing countries (Deininger, 2003) by increasing the capacity and will for the owners to invest in the land, to care for it, and to make it more productive (Jacobs, 2008). This was the objective of the main levee law endorsed in 2005. The owners of cooperatives’ collective rights were seen as reluctant to initiate farm improvements (land, equipment, plantations), compared with the owners of private rights. This perspective leads to a law that allows cooperatives beneficiaries to become private owners of their agricultural land. The specific situation of farmland in the peri-urban area of growing cities was obviously underestimated; market-based land prices make selling the land for urban use the rational and frequent decision of farmers. No land regulation policy at either the local or

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Fig. 3. Agrarian reform cooperatives and urbanization within the study area

national scale has prevented the progressive urbanization of cooperative lands. In this policy vacuum, the “econocentric farmland ethic” (Spaling and Wood, 1998) prevails with its view of land as a commodity whose value is determined by buyers (real estate promoters and agricultural investors) and sellers (small farmers) in the market. Collective properties subject to the agricultural cooperative reforms are particularly vulnerable to land use competition. In the Meknes region, 32 cooperatives cover a total surface of around 15,000 ha and a UUA (used agricultural area) of 14,000 ha distributed among 1119 assignees.1 Beginning in 2006 many farmers decided to acquire their land and then subsequently sold part or all of the property to real estate promoters. At least three of the cooperatives located closest to the city fringe have almost completely disappeared, and approximately 60% of the others have been partially sold. The detailed analysis of these changes is fully described in Valette et al. (2013). The existing cooperatives and the urbanized areas are displayed in Fig. 3. The second key driver identified in peri-urban land issues was the dispensation law (1999, 20032 ), which allows the approval of building permits that conflict with the municipal zoning plan and the general Master Plan. This dispensation law clearly contradicts land-use policies imposing obligations (e.g. zoning) and state land legislation, both aiming to protect cropland and to ensure food supply. As in the main levée land reform, dispensation aims to facilitate economic investments and urban development, in accordance with the government’s emphasis on economic progress for Morocco. Social housing projects, considered as a national priority, constitute the largest sector of granted dispensations. Since 2003 Meknes officials have examined 116 dispensation projects and granted 77, of which 34% are real estate projects. These numbers highlight the extent to which land use is at variance with the zoning plans. Since dispensation laws randomly bend the rules, municipal zoning plans cannot be considered as a significant factor in the understanding of land use competition. But land tenure seems a good indicator of vulnerability to urbanization. As mentioned above, collective lands and cooperatives from the agrarian reform were found to be particularly vulnerable.

2.7. Economic drivers The profitability and sustainability of agricultural production strongly influences the decision of farmers to sell their lands or to maintain their farming production. From a production sustainability perspective, some surveys showed an improvement of production capacity for small/medium cooperative farmers as a result of the main levée reform. Around 60% of the farmers declared that they improved or are planning to improve their production system, for instance, through the introduction of drip irrigation or changing the production system to more specialized crops. But it should also be noted that only farmers with capital or personal business skills improved their production activities. Most of the “innovative” farmers developed their production capacity by selling part of their land and investing the capital. At the same time, all of the farmers testified to the lack of collective or public actions supporting their strategies and investments. Moreover, the huge increase of land prices virtually eliminated any possibility for small farmers to compete with construction interests for available land. In some cases, the sale price of land eligible for construction can rise to 3,000,000 dirhams/ha (1 Moroccan Dirham is around 0.11 USD), whereas cost of non-constructible or agricultural land is normally much lower, generally between 400,000 and 600,000 dirhams/ha. These prices can vary considering different factors: for urbanization the main factor is the distance from the main roads and the proximity to the city; for agricultural lands the determining factor is usually the availability of irrigation. These high prices contribute significantly to the speculation in land sales. In fact, most of the farmers belonging to the remaining cooperatives indicated that their production strategy at the moment is “to wait”, meaning that they are waiting for a good offer from a construction project in order to sell their lands. Almost half of them plan to use the profits to buy new houses and invest in new activities other than agriculture. But the other half plan to re-invest the capital by purchasing agricultural lands far from the city. On average, the price per hectare of land located between 5 and 10 km from the city is 10 times more than the price of land found 30 km from the city. 2.8. Environmental drivers

1

In the cooperatives, each assignee owns between 12 and 14 ha of UAA and 1000 m2 for dwelling. 2 Circular 254 of February 1999 modified by the circular no 3020/27 of March 4th, 2003.

Morphological and topographical characteristics and the existing land use transitions were identified as the main geographical and environmental drivers of land use competition. On one hand, some sub-areas of the rural–urban fringe of Meknes cannot be

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Fig. 4. Land use changes in the Meknes peri-urban areas between 2001 and 2011.

urbanized because of their morphological structure: the three existing rivers have carved rocky gorges that are unsuitable for construction. On the other hand, some topographical features, such as the main road axes, are indicated as determinants of increasing urbanization. At the same time, areas near land that is currently in transition are obviously more vulnerable to urbanization than more remote or rural zones. Examining land use changes between 2001 and 2011, the results from the remote sensing analysis showed that 2.4% of the agricultural areas existing in 2001 became urbanized by 2011 and 6.1% was transformed into bare soil, which can be considered as a first step toward urbanization. During this time lapse, urbanized areas went from approximately 3000 ha to more than 4000 ha, an urbanization rate of 2.9% with the bulk of change occurring in proximity to the city center, and particularly on the western fringe. We can also identify other areas subjected to significant urbanization along two main road axes: the southern axe from Meknes to the desert, and the eastern axe from Meknes to Fez. Focusing on urbanization patterns, the analysis of the textural typology of building structures showed that 20% of new construction was concentrated within the existing urban grid, while the greatest extent of new construction represents a peripheral extension or urban sprawl into new zones. The results of the remote sensing analysis are shown in Fig. 4. 2.9. Development of spatial explicit indicators and mapping of land use competition Among the three classes previously described, we identified the following drivers of land use competition: (1) public planning policies related to different land tenure status, (2) profitability and sustainability of agricultural systems, (3) proximity to areas where land use is currently in transition and (4) morphological and topographic landscape structures. In order to obtain a synthetic map of land use competition, we generated spatial explicit indicators of the identified drivers, as showed on the Fig. 5. The indicators were then organized in a GIS-MCDA (Malczewski, 2006). Land prices were not included in the mapping, however we did consider proximity to roads and the city as it affects varying land prices, and the assumption was verified by the current cost of land offered for sale in these areas. For each of the spatially represented factors, we assigned a level of risk for potential land use competition ranging from 0 to 5, as reported in Table 1. Distance intervals were assigned different risk levels, depending on an estimation of the neighbourhood’s direct and indirect effects on the probability of construction activity. This estimate is based on observations that direct effects of land use transition occur in the first 200 m beyond an existing structure (e.g.

Fig. 5. Overall scheme of the identified drivers and indicators for mapping land use competition

roads or cities), while indirect effects are observable at a distance of 600–900 m. The analysis of potential conflict was conducted through a multi-criteria scheme. We identified four levels of risk for potential conflict, corresponding to null, low, medium or high risk. To each driving factor we then assigned a spatialization of the risk level. We did not, however, assign different weights for the selected factors since the previous assessment suggests that their influence on land competition dynamics is relatively equivalent. After the spatialization of each driving factor, we summarize them to generate a synthetic map of the potential risk of conflict. The synthetic map of land use competition risk is showed in Fig. 6. The map shows that 16% of the study area can be considered to have a very high risk for land use competition, 37% has a high risk, 35% medium risk, and 11% of the area has low or null risk. Results show a higher concentration of potential land conflict in the southern area of Meknes. In particular, very high risks are located along the main road connecting the center of the city to the Municipality of Boufekrane, and along the west-east axis near the city. 3. Discussion The highest vulnerability to urbanization is located mainly in the southern part of the peri-urban area of Meknes. This distribution is significant, because it coincides with the Saiss plain area, where agricultural activities are widespread and agro-pedo-climatic conditions are especially favorable for agricultural production. But this area has also been subject to extensive urban development and industrialization during recent years. The zone includes the principle transportation axes subject to urbanization pressure, the national roads Meknes-Boufekrane (going to the southern of Morocco), Meknes-Fez, and also the national road to Rabat. These results are particularly relevant to land use planning issues. The area studied has been affected, and it will continue to be affected in the coming years, by different development projects related not only to urban expansion but also to agricultural production. A dairy production was established in 1985, and has expanded significantly in the last 10 years. The plant now has direct relationships with multination enterprises for secondary products and occupies a surface of approximately 30 ha. The National School for

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Table 1 Level of vulnerability to urbanization assigned to each indicator. Land use competition indicator

Level of vulnerability Very high

High

Medium

Low

Null

Slope Distance from LUC areas (m) Route distance (m) City distance (m) Typology of agricultural system

Valleys 0–200 0–200 0–500 Winter cereals

Lower slope 200–500 200–500 500–1000 Non-irrigated horticulture

Gentle slope 500–1000 500–1000 1000–3000 Non-irrigated arboriculture

Upper slope >5000 >2000 >5000 –

Land tenure types

Agricultural reform cooperatives

Other collective properties

State properties and guich properties

Steep slope 1000–5000 1000–2000 3000–5000 Irrigated arboriculture and horticulture Private (melk) properties

Agriculture (ENA – Ecole Nationale d’Agriculture) and the national institute for research in agronomy (INRA – Institut National de Recherche Agronomique) are located nearby. In addition, a new project called Agropolis is being developed in the same area on 130 ha that were set aside in 2012. The project seeks to improve the competitiveness of the agricultural industry in the Meknes region, and functions within the context of Morocco’s national agricultural development strategy (“Plan Maroc Vert” – Green Morocco Plan) launched in 2008. These projects show that there is strong interest in developing the agricultural production of this area. But at the same time, this interest appears to be focused on large agricultural enterprises rather than the small farmers that are predominant in the area. Furthermore, these projects seem to have little

–

relationship to the peri-urban structure of the area, and the possibility of UPA development does not appear to be part of any existing or prospective plans. Under these conditions, there is a risk that development of new, specialized and intensive agricultural systems in the area could totally replace the existing system characterized by small cooperative farmers. Meknes is physically constructed like the typical urban settlement in Mediterranean countries as described by Kasanko et al. (2006), and has a compact and densely populated structure. But its compact urban development driven by government housing projects has not seen the same broad expansion experienced by northern Mediterranean cities which faced a rapid sprawling urban expansion in the 1990s similar to other European cities (Kasanko

Fig. 6. Map of land use competition risk in the study area.

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et al., 2006). This type of extensive expansion has been examined in many different case studies of big cities around the Mediterranean basin, such as Barcelona (Catalán et al., 2008), Rome (Salvati et al., 2012), Athens (Salvati et al., 2013a,b) or Istanbul (C¸akir et al., 2008), but also for medium cities more similar to the Meknes case study, such as Naples (Papa and Mazeo, 2014) and Thessaloniki (Lagarias, 2012). But currently, there are still very few studies on urban sprawl or urban expansion in the southern Mediterranean countries, and the assessment of urban development dynamics in this region is a research topic that needs more attention. The proposed methodology aims to integrate various data and to analyze rural–urban fringe dynamics in order to propose a preliminary assessment of land use competition areas, as a decision support tool for future public policies. GIS-MCDA represents a useful tool for synthesizing and summarizing quantitative and qualitative spatial data to generate an integrative final map that could be directly utilized by the policy makers. In particular, GIS-MCDA has already been used in many case-studies to explore different planning options or priority sites for intervention in conflict areas (Brody et al., 2006; CoutinhoRodrigues et al., 2011). Most of the applications are related to the assessment of environmental risk areas, and they target the production of synthetic and easily understandable maps as a support system for land management (Feizizadeh and Blaschke, 2012; Passuello et al., 2012). Our work is integrated into this framework. At the same time, few studies on the rural–urban fringe have been carried out with these tools, and the intention of mapping land use competition areas. Bottero et al. (2013) applied a GIS-MCDA in order to assess biodiversity conservation in a highly urbanized area. One of the main advantages they found in their case-study is the possibility of inserting the stakeholders’ point of view into the assessment. This is also one of the opportunities found in our research, and involving different stakeholders in the process of local planning has been one of our goals. In this sense, the interviews carried out for the project could be considered a preliminary step for a more participatory planning process. This is especially interesting for peri-urban areas, which are considered as particularly subject to land use competition. Moreover, the methodology we applied allowed us to easily obtain spatial explicit indicators in a situation with limited data. This is often the case when working in developing countries where the availability of digitalized and spatialized data is poor. The step between theoretical land use competition drivers and spatial features used as indicators required in some cases a simplification of the conceptual meaning of the driver. But at the same time, it allows us to synthesize and concretize these concepts in a way directly usable for preliminary planning assessment. Further research is needed in order to validate the applied methodology and to follow the implementation process. However, a preliminary assessment has been carried out by overlaying the generated map with spatial information about land use stakes or conflicts taken from existing planning tools and stakeholders. Of particular note, there are existing social conflicts over land use issues that are located mainly in the north-eastern peri-urban area. This area also corresponds to one of the main risk zones.

4. Conclusion The proximity of agricultural lands to the city of Meknes has become a source of land use competition, and this proximity has not been fully exploited as an accessible resource in terms of market potential. These conditions point to a need for new planning strategies which integrate the vulnerability of peri-urban agricultural systems into urban management. The south-east fringe of Meknes has characteristics suitable for a pilot area focused on the development of projects designed to foster connections between local agricultural production and the city’s markets. But at the

same time, existing planning instruments should be adapted to these characteristics. For instance, zones for agricultural protection and implementation could be set aside, in order to prevent the urbanization encouraged by existing projects to submerge local agricultural production. Currently, the Moroccan strategy for agricultural development seems to favor large agro-industrial farms rather than small family farms. These conditions are causing the de-localization of small farms toward areas further away from the city, such as the province of El-Hajeb, south of Meknes. Looking at the methodology, a validation of the results could improve the analysis. In particular, the synthetic map of potential conflicts could be used as a starting point for improving the discussion among stakeholders with very different perspectives regarding the territory, such as farmers, decision makers and actors in real estate. This study is a preliminary assessment of the potential land use competition in the area examined, and it can be used as a basis to implement different planning strategies in the areas identified as more vulnerable to land use change and urbanization. The map of potential stakes functions as an easily readable and understandable support tool for policy makers working in urban and agricultural planning. Acknowledgements This work was supported by the French National Research Agency (DAUME ANR-2010-STRA-007-01) and by the 2011–2012 Research Award sponsored by the Global Fund for Environment and Conflict Resolution assigned to Marta Debolini through the CICR – Center for Environmental Conflict Resolution of the Columbia University (NY). The authors wish to thank the local partners in Morocco for their support in field activity, especially Pr. Mohammed El Amrani, Pr. ZoubirChattou and Pr. El Hassan Abdellaoui from the ENAM (Ecole Nationale d’Agriculture de Meknes). We also would like to acknowledge all the people who agreed to participate in our interviews. The authors wish to thank Ben Boswell for the English review. References Abdouh, M., El Atrouz, A., Mechkouri, A., 2004. Agendas 21 locaux pour la promotion de l’environnement et du développement durable en milieu urbain: Profil environnemental de Meknès. Ministère de l’Aménagement du Territoire, de l’Eau et de l’Environnement, Maroc, pp. 94. Alessa, L., Kliskey, A., Brown, G., 2008. Social–ecological hotspots mapping: a spatial approach for identifying coupled social–ecological space. Landsc. Urban Plan. 85, 27–39. Allen, A., 2003. Environmental planning and management of the peri-urban interface: perspectives on an emergin field. Environ. Urban. 15 (1), 135–148. Asseng, S., Foster, I.A.N., Turner, N.C., 2011. The impact of temperature variability on wheat yields. Global Change Biol. 17, 997–1012. Berry, D., Plaut, T., 1978. Retaining agricultural activities under urban pressures: a review of land use conflicts and policies. Policy Sci. 9 (2), 153–178. Bottero, M., Comino, E., Duriavig, M., Ferretti, V., Pomarico, S., 2013. The application of a Multicriteria Spatial Decision Support System (MCSDSS) for the assessment of biodiversity conservation in the Province of Varese (Italy). Land Use Policy 30, 730–738. Brody, S.D., Highfield, W., Arlikatti, S., Bierling, D.H., Ismailova, R.M., Lee, L., et al., 2004. Conflict on the coast: using geographic information systems to map potential environmental disputes in Matagorda Bay, Texas. Environ. Manag. 34 (1), 11–25. Brody, S.D., Grover, H., Bernhardt, S., Tang, Z., Whitaker, B., Spence, C., 2006. Identifying potential conflict associated with oil and gas exploration in Texas state coastal waters: a multicriteria spatial analysis. Environ. Manag. 38, 597–617. Brown, G., Raymond, C.M., 2014. Methods for identifying land use conflict potential using participatory mapping. Landsc. Urban Plan. 122, 196–208. Brueckner, J.K., 2000. Urban sprawl: diagnosis and remedies. Int. Reg. Sci. Rev. 23 (2), 160–171. C¸akir, G., Ün, C., Baskent, E.Z., Köse, S., Sivrikaya, F., Keles¸, S., 2008. Evaluating urbanization, fragmentation and land use/land cover change pattern in Istanbul city, Turkey from 1971 TO 2002. Land Degrad. Dev. 19, 663–675. Caron, A., Torre, A., 2006. Quand la proximité devient source de tensions: conflits d’usages et de voisinage dans l’espace rural. In: Développement

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