King Mohammed VI of Morocco asked Moroccans on Wednesday to abstain from performing the rite of slaughtering sheep on Eid al-Adha this year due to a drop in the country\u2019s herd following years of drought. <\/p>\n
Eid al-Adha, to take place in June, commemorates the willingness of Ibrahim, or Abraham, to sacrifice his son on God\u2019s command. Muslims mark the event by slaughtering sheep or goats. The meat is shared among family and donated to the poor. <\/p>\n
Morocco\u2019s cattle and sheep herds have decreased by 38% in 2025 since the last census nine years ago due to consecutive droughts, according to official figures. <\/p>\n
\u201cOur commitment to enabling you to fulfill this religious rite under the best conditions is accompanied by the duty to consider the climatic and economic challenges facing our country, which have led to a significant decline in livestock numbers,\u201d the King said in a letter read on his behalf by religious affairs minister Ahmed Taoufiq on state TV Al Oula. <\/p>\n
Performing the rite \u201cunder these difficult circumstances will cause significant harm to large segments of our people, especially those with limited income,\u201d said the King, Morocco\u2019s supreme religious leader. <\/p>\n
Rainfall was 53% lower this year than the average of the last 30 years, causing a lack of pasture for livestock to feed on. Meat production has dropped, leading to higher prices in the local market and higher imports of live cattle, sheep and red meat. <\/p>\n
The country has recently signed a deal to import up to 100,000 sheep from Australia. <\/p>\n
In its 2025 budget, Morocco suspended import duties and a value-added tax on cattle, sheep, camels and red meat to keep prices stable in the domestic market. <\/p>\n<\/p>\n
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King Mohammed VI of Morocco asked Moroccans on Wednesday to abstain from performing the rite of slaughtering sheep on Eid al-Adha this year due to a drop in the country\u2019s herd following years of drought. Eid al-Adha, to take place in June, commemorates the willingness of Ibrahim, or Abraham, to sacrifice his son on God\u2019s…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3801,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3800","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/republicanstradetoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3800","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/republicanstradetoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/republicanstradetoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/republicanstradetoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/republicanstradetoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3800"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/republicanstradetoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3800\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/republicanstradetoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3801"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/republicanstradetoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3800"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/republicanstradetoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3800"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/republicanstradetoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3800"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}