The Reuse of Treated Wastewater (RWW) encompasses a variety of projects that are raising great hopes in the countries of the South, especially in agriculture. At the beginning of 2021, the IME (Institut méditerranéen de l’Eau) initiated international coordination of the project at six sites: Algeria, Bolivia, Morocco, Palestine, Senegal and Tunisia. Financed by the RMC Agency and AFD as part of its Adapt’ Action programme, the project was launched in January 2019 for a period of 12 months and involves the Société du Canal de Provence (SCP) and the Société des Eaux de Marseille (SEM) with the support of various local organisations.

In Tunisia, while the GDAs, supervised by the local DGGREE, were launching a drive to modernise their irrigated areas, REUT feasibility studies involving full multi-factor diagnostics and the deployment of pilot projects were being carried out on behalf of the IME, under the supervision of the Office national de l’assainissement de Tunisie (ONAS), for which REUT is one of its 6 major R&D themes.

Several visits led to the selection of the Sousse-sud and Mahdia sites for the implementation of an integrated pilot scheme for agricultural wastewater treatment.

After the financial package, it includes: (1) the design of the plot irrigation system; (2) agronomic expertise and choice of crops; (3) execution studies for all the hydraulic works; and (4) the social water management scheme.

This project, which is being carried out in consultation with the sanitation and agricultural sectors, aims to produce results that can be used to advance the REUSE sector in Tunisia as a whole. In 2021, most of the projects will take place in Morocco, in rural areas, and will target access to drinking water. As for the projects funded in Lebanon, Palestine and Tunisia, they are almost all long-term decentralised cooperation projects involving exchanges of knowledge and skills, as is the case with some French associations.