 system, turning it very dry and extremely warm during the summer (that can last several months), especially on the lowlands and on the valleys faced to the Sahara. Here it starts the big Desert Sahara and it is perfectly visible, for example, on the Draa Valley, on which it is possible to find oases, sand dunes and rocky desert landscapes. So the climate in this region is desert.
Morocco is known for its biodiversity; Avifauna being the most notable. The avifauna of Morocco includes a total of 454 species, five of which have been introduced by humans, and 156 are rarely or accidentally seen.
The last Barbary lion in the wild was shot in the Atlas Mountains in 1922. The other two primary predators of northern Africa, the Atlas bear and Barbary leopard, are now extinct and critically endangered, respectively.
Imports and exports
Farmers in Morocco’s fertile coastal plains grow sugar beets, grains, fruits, and vegetables in order to sell in Europe. Morocco’s major export is foods, all kinds of food, from nuts to meat to fruits. Many farmer raise livestock, mainly sheep. Although Morocco is rich in foods one of their major imports are manufactured goods, which may contain foods. They may also contain cloths, school supplies, etc.
Moroccan trade is still dominated by its main import and export partner France, although France's share in Moroccan trade is declining, in favour of the US, the Gulf Region and China. If seen as a single entity, the EU is by far Morocco's largest trading partner. In recent years, Morocco has reduced its dependence on phosphate exports, emerging as an exporter of manufactured and agricultural products, and as a growing tourism destination. However, its competitiveness in basic manufactured goods, such as textiles, is hampered by low labour productivity and high wages. Morocco is dependent on imported fuel and its food import requirement can rise substantially in drought years, as in 2007. Although Morocco runs a structural trade deficit, this is typically offset by substantial services earnings from tourism and large remittance inflows from the diaspora, and the country normally runs a small current-account surplus.
Most Moroccans practice Sunni Islam and are of Arab and Berber ethnic background. Arabs and Berbers make up about 99.1% of the Moroccan population., which each one constituting about half the population of the state.
Morocco has been inhabited for at least the last 200,000 years. Berbers are the indigenous people and still make up the bulk of the population. Muslim Arabs conquered the territory that would become Morocco in the 7th and 11th centuries, at the time under the rule of various late Byzantine Roman leaders and indigenous Berber and Romano-Berber principalities, laying the foundation for the emergence of an Arab-Berber culture. The Arab occupation was brief and was ended by revolting Berbers who later founded numerous Muslim Berber kingdoms. A sizeable portion of the population is identified as Haratin and Gnawa (or Gnaoua), black or mixed race. Morocco's Jewish minority (265,000 in 1948) has decreased significantly and numbers about 5,500 (See History of the Jews in Morocco). Most of the 100,000 foreign residents are French or Spanish. Some of them are colonists' descendants, who primarily work for European multinational companies, others are married to Moroccans and preferred to settle in Morocco. Prior to independence, Morocco was home to half a million Europeans.
According to The Medieval Legends, In the 12th and 13th centuries there was an invasion of Arab nomads from The Fatimid Empire located in North Eastern Africa, known as Banu Hilal and Banu Sulaym tribes who were a bunch of Arabized Libyan Tribes founded in the Fayum Oasis in Egypt and Cyrenaica of Libya, swept the Eastern Maghreb, but recent studies make clear no significant genetic differences exist between Arabic speaking and non-Arabic speaking populations, highlighting that in common with most of the Arab World, Arabization was mainly via acculturation of non-Arab indigenous populations over time. The Moorish re