In this context, an agreement was signed on Thursday, July 14, 2011 between the Mohammed VI Foundation for Environmental Protection, the Agency for the Promotion and Economic and Social Development of the Southern Provinces of the Kingdom, and the National Fisheries Research Institute. It aims to promote environmental awareness through advocacy and education to gradually create a global vision to protect the Oued Eddahab bay based on a pragmatic and sustainable approach in which local stakeholders are implicitly involved.

The Oued Eddahab bay, unique in Africa, is an exceptional site of great biological and ecological interest due to its high biodiversity, its natural setting and its incomparable location.

This large, elongated marine bay (37 km long and 13.5 km wide), covering an area of 40,000 ha and separated from the Atlantic Ocean along its entire length by a dune, is both a migration relay and a wintering area for thousands of nesting waterfowl.

The bay is also known for its marine mammal (dolphins) populations and is an excellent site for the development of aquaculture activities.

This project, which includes all stakeholders, supports the current national momentum to establish environmental protection as a key factor of economic and social development. It will contribute to the emergence of a common understanding of the vulnerabilities, potential, and future of wetlands. It will also raise stakeholder awareness about the impact of their actions on the state and fate of these areas in order to develop a strategy of individual responsibility and promote eco-behavior. This will be accomplished through the emergence of a dynamic group process that targets the sustainable development of coastal areas in general and the Oued Eddahab bay in particular, in order to make our heritage a natural source of sustainable benefits to be enjoyed by future generations.

The city of Dakhla, a southern pearl connected to the Oued Eddahab bay, benefits from the convergent government development actions, particularly through the various urban development programs undertaken by the Agence du Sud in consultation with local stakeholders and as part of an integrated logic aimed to benefit inhabitants, and improve wastewater sanitation, solid waste treatment, drinking water, roads, street lighting, parks and community facilities.

The environmental education and awareness provided by this partnership will ensure the sustainability of the actions taken.