Siroua Wool Project

The Siroua Wool Project is a collaborative effort led by two non-profit organizations, Maroc Inédit and memòri lab, since 2017. Its primary goal is to protect and promote the Siroua sheep breed, a resilient native species recognized for producing Morocco's finest wool. This breed is currently at risk of extinction. The sheep are found in the Siroua valleys between the Toubkal mountain range and the desert, as well as on the Anti-Atlas plateaus, which are home to the artisan weaving village where memòri lab works.

On the ground in this region, we’ve seen that women for whom weaving is the main source of income, rely almost entirely on low-quality industrial wool. That wool is purchased in local markets and supplied by wholesalers from Marrakech. Morocco's last industrial spinning mills are located in Rabat, Salé, Chefchaouen, and Marrakech. Meanwhile, Morocco is also importing high-quality fleeces from Spain, Great Britain, Australia, and New Zealand to meet the quality demands of rug designers.

The Siroua sheep is a truly remarkable local product, prized for the quality of its wool and its meat, making it appealing to both designers and restaurateurs. This native breed is an integral part of the region's socio-economic and ecological heritage, living in harmony with the local ecosystem.

The project is designed to support a sustainable livestock sector with a breed uniquely adapted to the semi-arid rangelands of the region. It focuses on preserving biodiversity and promoting the participatory management of collective resources tribes—water and pastures—known as the agdal.

Our organizations are actively supporting the Imelsine N'Siroua agricultural cooperative, which is dedicated to producing and harvesting Siroua wool. This cooperative is a groundbreaking initiative, being the first shearing cooperative of its kind in Morocco.

We provide a range of support, including:

• Wool expertise and technical training, covering topics like sheep selection and best practices for fleece harvesting.
• Market research, helping to find new buyers and opportunities.
• Acting as an intermediary between the cooperative and spinning mills, with the ultimate goal of the cooperative becoming fully autonomous.
• Providing communication and marketing tools.

For the past three shearing seasons, a team of professionals from the French Sheep Shearers' Organization (ATM) has volunteered to lead field schools. These training sessions address the current lack of wool expertise in Morocco by teaching best practices for fleece harvesting.

Results and Progress

The project has shown tangible results:

• 2023 Harvest: 3.5 tons of wool were pre-purchased by producers and designers.
• 2024 Harvest: 4.5 tons were pre-purchased.

All funds are paid directly to the breeders. An allocation of 7 dirhams per kilogram is set aside to cover the cooperative's operational costs and to co-fund future training sessions.

Simultaneously, we are working on breed selection and conservation with Philippe Gayet, a French breeder and expert in wool breeds. As a second-generation sheep selector, his expertise is invaluable in this effort.

All of our work, including the volunteer-led training by ATM members, has been independently funded by Maroc Inédit and Memòri Lab, with additional support from La Fibre Textile in 2024/2025.

A High-Quality, Resilient Breed, Perfectly Suited to its Environment

The Siroua sheep is a remarkable breed, providing a high-quality wool ideal for making rugs and woolen cloth. The fleece is either a uniform white or black (ranging from brown to black), with long, lustrous fibers up to 28 cm. The fibers are a medium-fine 25-35 microns and contain no kemp. This specific wool is what made the rugs from the Aït Ouaouzguit tribes—a confederation of tribes from the Siroua valleys and foothills, west of Ouarzazate—so famous.

This sheep is perfectly adapted to its environment. It is small in size. Its fleece helps it withstand the extreme daily and seasonal temperature swings of the region. Under this semi-aride climate the unique morphology of the Siroua sheep allows it to make the most of the available pasture resources. Unlike other breeds not suited to this environment, it does not uproot plants. Its narrow jaw allows it to graze on grass right next to rocks and under thorny bushes, and its hooves and gait enable it to navigate steep slopes up to 3,000 meters. The breed adapts well to the high variability of food supply. It is an “accordion breed” because it can mobilize its body reserves during lean times and quickly replenish them when food is plentiful. It is also resistant to common diseases and parasites.

An Endangered Heritage

Despite its many qualities, the Siroua breed is endangered.

In the early 1980s, a national sheep breeding plan was implemented, creating a catalog that included only five Moroccan breeds: Sardi, Tamadhite, D'Man, Boujaad, and Beni M'Guild. These were chosen for their meat productivity, while the more rustic, high-mountain breeds were excluded. Although these breeds had lower production and reproduction rates, they were well-suited to their environment and to the practice of transhumance.

The Siroua breed, in particular, was better preserved than other mountain breeds because its massif was isolated for a long time and supported a dynamic agropastoral system. The Siroua sheep was not officially added to the list of local Moroccan breeds until 2014.

Wool harvesting is a crucial but often neglected step in the wool industry.
To ensure the value of the wool, proper harvesting practices are essential.
This includes:

Shearing Practices

The workspace must be clean to avoid contaminating the wool with dust and plant debris, and as comfortable as possible to ensure a quality shearing.

The sheep pens are stone enclosures without electricity, so blade shearing is the preferred method. This method offers several key advantages:

• It leaves enough wool on the sheep shielding them from both cold and sunburn.
• It results in better wool quality.
• It does not interrupt wool growth, unlike mechanical shearing, which stresses the follicle and stops growth for about 10 days.
• While it’s slower, it’s also silent, and shearers often sing while they work.

During shearing field schools, we provided high-quality shears and trained the shearers in their proper care.

Sorting

Sorting depends on the breed and the wool's intended use. After removing the wool from the legs and hindquarters—which can be used for agricultural purposes—the fleece is taken off in a single piece to facilitate sorting.

Siroua wool is relatively simple to sort because its fleeces are homogeneous and primarily used for carpets. To streamline this process, we have built dedicated sorting tables. Here, we meticulously remove vegetable matter, paint marks, second cuts, and felted sections. Since many of our herds are mixed breeds, we take special care to separate colors and identify any fleeces containing kemp. Lamb fleeces are also sorted separately.

Storage

We provide durable, reusable woolpacks to replace the common plastic bags that can disintegrate and contaminate the wool.

Manual processing of fleeces had been nearly abandoned in the Siroua region.
A small, private production still exists in the Feija tribe to the south (in the Anti-Atlas), but it doubles the time needed to make a rug. Faced with an abundance of inexpensive industrial wool, weavers can no longer earn a living from this work.

Furthermore, certain steps, like carding with two wooden boards studded with nails, are physically demanding. The recent revival of hand-spinning is being driven by designers and producers of high- value products.

The project aims to support and improve this process through several innovations:

• Experimenting with fermentation washing, which saves water, requires less labor, and better preserves the fiber.
• Testing a washing method using ash lye from bread ovens, which has natural bleaching properties.
• Installing an agricultural tunnel for the quick drying of washed fleeces.
• Introducing drum carders, which are being made in Morocco based on a prototype from our partner, La Fibre Textile.
• Spinning: most spinning is still done with a traditional spindle—the most enjoyable and traditional step for spinners.

Currently, most carpet production uses synthetic dyes, as plant-based dyes have been in decline since the 20th century. Factors such as the high demand for carpets, limited plant resources due to drought, and the time-consuming process of natural dyeing have made it difficult to revive traditional methods.

We are seeking ecological alternatives that can be used on both hand crafted and semi-industrial scales.