Since the start of SmaCuMed in 2021, we have organized several trainings and workshop activities in Morocco as part of the goals and scope of our workpackage on capacity building.
This time we are planning our final conference from 14.-18 November, where we want to provide a platform for the scientific community to discuss about the importance of the “Water-Energy-Food-Ecosystems Nexus” and share our final results with an international audience.
In addition, we are organizing a workshop together with the Cit’e d’Innovation in Marrakesh to connect with industry and the private sector to promote investement in the field of sustainable agriculture.
Day 1: Workshop on promoting investment in Agriculture
The results of the first year of operation have been published together with our Partners at HKA, UCA, MIU and CERTE at scientific Journal Membranes from MDPI.
Here you will find the results of the desalination performance of both MCDI and LPRO, which we have now evaluated and compared. Results show a technological and economical assessment of the Smar-Cube during the one-year piloting at Essaoura, for the irrigation of Argan trees, focusing on the evaluation of Water Recovery and Desalination Performance, as well as important paramters like Specific Energy Consumption and Specific Water Costs (EUR/m³) (see fig. 1 below).
On June 21 and 22 of this year, SmaCuMed will held our 3rd and final Training Session targeting the topic of “Life Cycle Assessment (LCA)” as part of our socio-economic and sustainability evaluation.
LCA is an important tool to quantitative evaluate and measure the environmental impacts of products or processes in their life cycle. The Training is organized by experts on the topic of LCA-Enginieering from our associated partner Fraunhofer IBP in Stuttgar, Germany.
During the two days of training you will learn about the sustainability assessment and the framework of LCA and take part of unique hand-on excercises with LCA-modelling tools.
Register now*! Send us your CV (short version) and one or two paragraphs that explain for what purpose you are willing to use LCA analysis in the future. Limited places available**
*Registration: E-Mail us at: a.elabbassi@uca.ma **Max. number of participants: 35
Last month, our Partner Aquagri represented SmaCuMed at the Conference and Seminar “A Agricultura Do Algarve A Falar Sobre Agua” in Algarve, which was organized by AlgarOrange, a non-profit assosiation of Citrus Operators in Algarve, Portugal.
The Seminar took place at the Algarve University in Faro on May 24, 2023 and brought different sectors related to agriculture and industry together to discuss topics about water as a fundamental resource.
You can read more about on AlgarOrange-News or download the Seminar Programe below:
In the framework of the PRIMA SmaCuMed project & on the occasion of the International Women’s Day on March 08, 2023, the FSTE and the Research Team Biodiversity, Environment and Plant Protection and Plant Protection Research Team organized “A study day on the role of oasis women in the rationalization of water use“.
Women play essential socio-economic roles in the oases, contributing effectively to the oasis economy through activities that add value to local products thanks to know-how passed down from generation to generation. They have often developed agro-ecology projects to fight against water scarcity and soil impoverishment. Oasis women have understood that the protection of oases is crucial, not only for their ecological importance, but also for their economic value, since 90% of the economic activity of oases comes from agriculture.
This event has emphasized the fragility of the balance of these oasis ecosystems especially in a changing global context including climate change and those related to human activities inducing a scarcity of water, essential resource for the existence of oases. It also tried to define the role of the oasis woman in the rational use of this resource and this through a participatory diagnosis taking into account all components of the socio-economic life of the oasis.
There were 40 participants including 20 oasis women practicing agriculture, representatives of the Office Nationale de la mise en Valeur Agricole Tafilalet, Agence du Bassin Hydrolique Guir-Ziz- Gheris and the Office National du Conseil Agricole Tafilalet.
The work of this day began by giving a state of the water situation in the region of Tafilalet which clearly shows the scarcity of water in this region. The presentations and discussions focused on several areas related to the theme of water and women, namely:
– Women’s cooperatives and water management of agricultural resources in the Draa Tafilalet region – Rural woman / lack of water / What outcome? – Laundry / irrigation water pollution / prospects for improvement – Deterioration of educational role/woman/water/what role for professional organizations? – The place of women in the new Moroccan development model – Roles of women in the development of the Oasis Agrosystem
Une journée sur la femme oasienne et la rationalisation de l’utilisation de l’eau
Our next event will take place at the Faculty of Sciences and Technologies (FSTE) of the Moulay Ismail University in Errachidia –
In the framework of the PRIMA SmaCuMed project & on the occasion of the International Women’s Day, the FSTE and the Research Team Biodiversity, Environment and Plant Protection and Protection of Plants organizes an information day on the oasis woman and the rationalization of water use.
The Smart-Cube is now at its new location: Erfoud.
The next pilot phase will take place at a date palm plantation in the vecinity of Erfoud, in the region of Errachidia. Here, the cube will be tested for the irrigation of date palms in a arid-region, where water salinization is affecting farmers and local population with exuberating high salt concentration of up to 20 g/L.
Our team has started with the preparation of the pilots:
Smart-Cube setup including PV and desalination systems MCDI + LPRO
Drip lines for irrigation
Water and soil sensors
Pumping system
Cleaning the PV panels
Setting tanks for feed – and irrigation
The pilot trials are set to start mid January irrigating the date palms with three different target concentrations. The pilot trials shall show the response of date palms to different salinities and the feasability of the desalination systems in order to develop the best irrigation strategies in this case.
Intellectual property rights is a topic that concerns everyone: From research topics like publications and student theses – to musicians, designers, inventors – to the industry – with patents, commercial products, etc.
On December 08, 2022 SmaCuMed partners participated in an IPR- Workshop (@Steinbeis 2i GmbH) in Karlsruhe to explore ideas about our exploitable results.
We discussed topics like IPR protection, Licencing, Access Rights, know-how etc. in an interactive workshop with partners from Portugal, Germany and Morocco.
Members of SmaCuMed presented their most recent results on two renowned international conferences in November 2022.
The first visit was on the Euro-Mediterranean Conference for Environmental Integration (EMCEI22), in the first week of the month in the SmaCuMed Partner-country Tunisia in the city of Sousse.
Two different presentation were held. One by Abdelkarim Hdoufane of the Cady Ayyad University Marrakesh about the “Effects of Irrigation on the Phenology of Natural Populations of Argania Spinosa (L.) Skeels” and the other by Edgardo Canas Kurz from Karlsruhe University of Applied Sciences about the “Comparison of Solar Powered MCDI and RO Desalination for Mediterranean Agriculture”.
Being able to join the conference meant not only to dissiminate the results of the SmaCuMed project, but also have many very fruitful discussions about the Water-Energy-Food-Nexus in North-African countries with many dedicated researchers on this field on an international level and thus many new valueable contact could be set up.
The second visit was dedicated to the 40th anniversary edition of the Euromembrane 2022 conference, which was held in Sorrento, Italy.
The internationally well-known congress was the stage for showcasing findings of first years pilot trials of the SmartCubes performance in Essaouira, Morocco. This time the talk was indexed in the session for Electromembranes, where specialists for electro dialysis and capacitive deionization shared the most recent research.
Ulrich Hellriegel presenting first years pilot results (Photo: Edgardo Canas Kurz)The frame of the session for Electromembranes (Photo: Uiara Peixeiro)
Researchers of the Centre de Recherches et des Technologies des Eaux (CERTE) developed a multi-criteria approach for ranking potential aquifers for the application of our Smart-Cube and other desalination systems on the example of Tunisa.
The scientific paper was published in the Journal Sustainability. You can access and download the Open Access publication here: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/14/13/8113
Figure 5. Spatial distribution of suitability index variation for the installation of (a) SmaIrriCubeEff and (b) SmaIrriCubeAcc systems (Mehdaoui, et al. 2022)
