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Area Extension Agent Mark Apel spent the spring of 2016 and 2017 volunteering with the High Atlas Foundation in Morocco – an organization dedicated to helping the rural populations of the High Atlas Mountains in sustainable agriculture and women’s empowerment training. Through USAID’s Farmer to Farmer program, administered by Land O’Lakes International Development, Mark assisted the Foundation with an assessment of project-based water resources and recommendations for sustainability. Morocco has a similar climate and environmental conditions as the Southwest US, and is experiencing the impacts of climate change – decreased precipitation, increased flooding, warmer temperatures. Mark will discuss the changes he has seen since he was a Peace Corps Volunteer there over 30 years ago and the strategies that the High Atlas Foundation is undertaking to help rural communities adapt to a changing landscape.
Mark Apel is an Area Extension Agent in Community Resource Development with the University of Arizona Cooperative Extension in southern Arizona where he is implementing programs in land use planning, sustainable development, small acreage landowner assistance and renewable energy education. He has over 28 years of environmental and planning experience. Mark has been a Peace Corps Volunteer, as well as worked for the National Park Service, The Nature Conservancy, as a private consultant and ten years as a county planner addressing growth and development issues. His work has taken him to Morocco, Madagascar, Honduras and Mexico. Mark lives in Bisbee, Arizona – home of the Lavender Pit, Electric Beer and the oldest, continuously operating ballfield in the United States. He holds a B.S. in Environmental Resource Management (Pennsylvania State University, 1982) and an M.A. in International Affairs (Ohio University, 1987)..
Photo: By Dorieo - Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, Link