Casablanca – The year 2020 was the hottest ever recorded in Morocco, ahead of 2017 and 2010 respectively, said on Monday the General Directorate of Meteorology.

The year 2020 is the hottest year ever recorded in Morocco, ahead of 2017 and 2010 respectively, with a national annual average temperature anomaly of +1.4 °C compared to the climatological average over the period 1981-2010, said the body in a press release relating to the “synthesis of climate in Morocco in 2020”.

Morocco’s climate in 2020 was marked by unusually warm minimum and maximum annual temperatures and an almost generalized rainfall deficit throughout the country.

Morocco experienced a very dry and mild February and a remarkably hot month of July with monthly minimum and maximum temperature records broken in several cities.

In Fez, two new records of monthly maximum temperature of 23.78 °C in February and 40.4 °C in July were recorded exceeding the old records respectively of 2.24 °C and 2.15 °C.

In Mohammedia, a new monthly minimum temperature record of 22.28 °C was recorded in February.

The annual total rainfall in 2020 recorded a deficit over all of Morocco exceeding 50% north of Marrakech and in Souss-Massa and the Anti-Atlas regions, while it hardly rained in the southern provinces.

This year is classified among the 4 driest years since 1981. Regarding the crop year from September 2019 to August 2020, the rainfall deficit was around -33% impacting the national cereal production which experienced a decrease of -39% compared to the 2018-2019 campaign and -57% compared to an average year since 2008 (Green Morocco Plan).

In addition, Morocco has experienced several extreme weather events that have caused damage. Among these phenomena, summer heat waves, heavy thunderstorms, strong winds with gusts of 100 km/h, hailstorms as on June 06 which destroyed 900ha of crops in the region of Saiss and the Middle Atlas.

Morocco also experienced two noteworthy marine situations, on October 29 and December 5, 2020, with dangerous waves approaching 10 meters and which caused significant material damage in certain regions along the Atlantic coast.