Abhatoo - Centre Nationale de Documentation

In Morocco, The national higher education and research system has been rapidly evolving during the last decades with new actors, series of new policies and research funding programs, along with a profound change in the overall economic and political context of the country. In the agricultural sector, since 2008, policy has relied on “Moroccan Green Plan”, a national strategy for sustainable development. Despite the significant efforts to develop the sector, further actions are needed to face the remaining challenges (population growth and rural migration, scarcity of resources and climate change, etc). Adoptions of innovation-driven policies as well as the introduction of modern technologies relying on valorization of research results become therefore a necessity. The objective of the study is to analyze the agricultural research publications in Morocco during 2005-2016 period based on SCOPUS database. It examines the growth of publications and citations, the collaboration patterns through coauthorship, the main productive institution and national and international collaborations. Thematic orientations, through an original classification adapted to the agricultural field, is analyzed and aligned to the priorities set by the national research strategy. This pilot study could be useful for policy makers, researchers and engineers in the country in order to devise indicators that focus on orientations, strengths and weaknesses of the agricultural research system.