Household Gender Roles and Slow-Onset Environmental Change in Morocco: A Barrier or Driver to Develop Migration Aspirations?

Abstract

We study how slow-onset environmental changes impact the adaptive capacity of rural women living in the Souss-Massa region of Morocco. Given the immobility of many women in rural regions, we especially focus upon the internal migration aspirations of rural woman. In this way our study aims to shed light on the interrelationships between environmental change, gender relations and social and migration aspirations in a gradually environmentally degrading region. Based on Carling’s aspiration/ability model, we analyse how slow-onset environmental changes influence the internal migration aspirations and trajectories of rural women, taking into account important background factors such as household characteristics, land heritage systems and migration networks. Our study is based on 38 interviews with inhabitants of the Souss-Massa region of Morocco that (used to) work in the agricultural sector, of which 15 interviews were conducted with rural women. Our findings show the ambiguous role of slow-onset environmental changes in the development of migration aspirations of rural women in a Moroccan rural context and underscores that environmental changes should be taken into account in migration decision making processes, both for internal and international migration.

Keywords:

• Slow-onset environmental changes
• household gender roles
• migration aspirations

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 The large fruit and vegetable farms are typically commercial agribusinesses that are forced on producing corps for export or domestic markets and are owned and operated by larger companies. Small family farmers are often focused on subsistence farming, meaning that they produce crops primarily for their own use and for sale in local markets. Women who work on small family farms are more likely to be unpaid family members who help with farming activities, rather than paid employees (Baccar, Bouaziz, Dugué, & Le Gal, 2017).