Double trouble: French colonialism in Morocco and the early history of the Pasteur institutes of Tangier and Casablanca (1895-1932)

Morocco was the last North African country in which a Pasteur institute was created, nearly two decades later than in Tunisia and Algeria. In fact, two institutes were opened, the first in Tangier in 1913 and the second in Casablanca in 1932. This duplication, far from being a measure of success, was the material expression of the troubles Pastorians had experienced in getting a solid foothold in the country since the late 19th century. These problems partly derived from the pre-existence of a modest Spanish-Moroccan bacteriological tradition, developed since the late 1880s within the framework of the Sanitary Council and Hygiene Commission of Tangier, and partly from the uncoordinated nature of the initiatives launched from Paris and Algiers. Although a Pasteur Institute was finally established, with Paul Remlinger as director, the failure of France to impose its colonial rule over the whole country, symbolized by the establishment of an international regime in Tangier, resulted in the creation of a second centre in Casablanca. While elucidating many hitherto unclear facts about the entangled origins of both institutes, the author points to the solidity of the previously independent Moroccan state as a major factor behind the troubled translation of Pastorianism to Morocco. Systematically dismissed or downplayed by colonial and postcolonial historiography, this solidity disrupted the French takeover of the country and therefore Pastorian expectations.

Emergy analysis of a silvo-pastoral system, a case study in southern Portugal

The Mediterranean silvo-pastoral system known as Montado, in Portugal, is a complex land use system composed of an open tree stratum in various densities and an herbaceous layer, used for livestock grazing. Livestock also profit from the acorns, and the grazing contributes to avoid shrub encroachment. In the last 20 years, subsidies from the European Union have greatly promoted cattle rearing in this system and the introduction of heavy breeds, at the expense of sheep, goats or the native cattle breeds. The balance of the traditional system is thus threatened, and a precise assessment of the balance between the different components of the system, therefore is highly needed. The goal of this study was to gain a better under- standing of a Montado farm system with cattle rearing as the major economic activity by applying the emergy evaluation method to calculate indices of yield, investment, environmental loading and sustainability. By integrating different ecosystem components, the emergy evaluation method allows a comprehensive evaluation of this complex and multifunctional system at the scale of an individual farm. This method provides a set of indices that can help us understand the system and design management strategies that maximize emergy flow in the farm. In this paper, we apply the emergy evaluation method to a Montado farm with cattle rearing, as a way to gain a better understanding of this system at the farm scale. The value for the transformity of veal (2.66E?06 sej J-1) is slightly higher, when compared to other systems producing protein. That means that the investment of nature and man in this product was higher and it requires a premium price on the market. The renewa- bility for Holm Oaks Farm (49 %), lower than for other similar systems, supports the assumption that this is a farm in which, comparing with others, the number of purchased inputs in relation to renewable inputs provided by nature, is higher. The Emergy Investment Ratio is 0.91 for cattle rearing compared to a value of 0.49 for cork and 0.43 for firewood harvesting, making it clear that cattle rearing is a more labor demanding activity comparing with extractive activities as cork and firewood harvesting.