Errachidia

Under the 2015 decree on the regions, Errachidia is the capital of the Draa-Tafilalet region, which comprises the provinces of Errachidia, Ouarzazate, Midelt, Tinghir and Zagora.¹ At the 2024 census the municipality had 97,687 inhabitants in 22,944 households and the whole province 427,572.²

The town lies on the Oued Ziz in the north of its province. It used to be called Ksar es-Souk in Arabic and Imetgharen in Tamazight, and received its present name around 1975.³ Together with Meknes, Errachidia is one of the two campuses of Moulay Ismail University, which by its own account has ten institutions and more than 82,000 students.⁴

After the very violent floods of 1965 the state decided to build two large dams, the Hassan Addakhil on the Ziz and the Mansour Eddahbi on the Draa, together with new concrete canals. Since then the dam has held back the Ziz floods, which used to reach south of Merzouga quite often.⁵ The dam went into service in 1971, holds 312 million cubic metres and has a catchment of about 4,290 square kilometres.⁶

On 5 February 2026 the reservoir was 76 per cent full, holding 237 million cubic metres. For the water year from September 2025 to August 2026 the Guir-Ziz-Rheris river basin agency reserved 86 million cubic metres for irrigating the oases along the Ziz and the Tafilalet plain.⁷

The reservoir is part of the Oasis du Tafilalet Ramsar site, listed since 15 January 2005 and covering 15,300 hectares. The wetland includes a network of oases, the reservoir, small rivers, irrigation channels and marshes, and lies within a UNESCO biosphere reserve. Migratory birds winter here, among them the houbara bustard and the marbled teal; besides farming, sheep raising plays an important role.⁸

The municipality of Errachidia lies within the area of the protected geographical indication “Dattes Majhoul de Tafilalet”, recognised by the Ministry of Agriculture on 30 April 2010; the area covers municipalities of Errachidia province, among them Erfoud, Goulmima and Tinejdad. The dates come from the Majhoul variety of date palm and are brown, elongated, 2.5 to 6.5 centimetres long and weigh 15 to 30 grams; pollination follows traditional methods.⁹

In 2019 Errachidia Moulay Ali Cherif airport received a new terminal of 3,500 square metres for up to 300,000 passengers a year, financed by the Office National des Aéroports (ONDA) with 82.1 million dirhams.¹⁰ For 2018 ONDA gave a figure of about 36,000 passengers¹¹, while the airport management reported 41,120.¹²

The Errachidia weather station lies at 1,037 metres. Over the years 1991 to 2020 it recorded an average of 133 millimetres of precipitation a year, most of it in September and October; the mean daily maximum temperature ranged from 15.9 °C in January to 39.5 °C in July.¹³