Blog 1: Race/Ethnicity, Culture

     Moroccan Culture operates on a polychronic, flexible, communal culture. In terms of agriculture, this means that resources, information (business, technical, or otherwise), and, at times, harvest are shared amongst neighboring farms, friends, and people within the surrounding area (Eberman, 2012). Additionally, due to their flexibility and polychronic values, relationships between business partners, leaders, and friends are prioritized over efficiency, profit margins, and scheduling deadlines. Old Moroccan culture is also not gaudy in terms of displaying wealth as compared to American culture. The buildings are all displayed with same facades and only in the inside can wealth be displayed (Eberman, 2012). This was due to religious values as well as the belief that everyone should equal in their housing and project disparities. 

    In westernized culture, the moroccan values of building relationships (whether that be during mealtime, at work, or during meetings) can be viewed as laziness and contributing to their lack of economic development in comparison to the United States. While Morocco may be more impoverished and wealth disparities may be higher, the resulting effects of the communal culture are clear. There is only approximately 1% of the population that is food insecure compared to the 14% within the United States. Even as there are 700,000 people houseless and poverty stricken places, the people of Morocco have a culture that takes care of each other and their wellbeing, at the cost of becoming a "richer" capitalistic country (Eberman, 2012). 

As we have seen touring the farms in Morocco, time is not a priority for the leaders we have met with. The leaders want to prioritize the community they are welcoming and sharing the land upon which they are growing food. Every farm we have been to we have stayed for at least three to four hours and most of the time we do nothing more than share meals, tour the farm, and have discussions. I have sincerely appreciated this lifestyle and building of a community over just strictly "getting down to business" and having us shuffle quickly from farm to farm. I think that the content that we have learned has been.much more valuable because we have not had to rush through our tours and only receive the gist of the information. 

When talking to the young farmer with the CSA program, he said that he would never charge for water because he said he would never want the karma of charging a neighbor in need for something that he had excess of. Additionally, every other farmer has said that they all call friends to share information and ask questions about growing crops and running a business because the government does not provide that resource for them. We have also seen homes that are all presented the same from the outside and Emmanual and I had a discussion about how they are not as clean on the outside as they are in the United States. At first, I thought that I appreciated the American culture of presentation more, but after reading about the reasoning about modesty on the outside, I found it to be more impactful and representative of the Moroccan belief that the inside is what counts more than presenting as wealthy. It definitely contributes to their cultural belief of helping neighbors and friends because it will make you insides more happy than if you were to be rich at the cost of everyone else. 

https://digitalcollections.sit.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?referer=&httpsredir=1&article=3604&context=capstones