Habib Ayeb is a geographer, researcher and professor emeritus at the University of Paris 8 in Saint Denis, France. A specialist in social geography, his research areas cover issues related to food sovereignty, environment, peasant issues, climate change, marginality and poverty, social change, and the role of the environment in the development of food security … Its research areas are mainly focused on Tunisia and the whole of North Africa.
His latest major publication is the book with Professor Ray Bush of the University of Leeds (UK): Habib Ayeb & Ray Bush (2019) Food Insecurity and Revolution in the Middle East and North Africa. Agrarian Questions in Egypt and Tunisia”. Anthem Press, London.
He is also a committed documentary filmmaker. Among his films:
- Om-Layoun (2021 – on water issues),
- Couscous : Seeds of Dignity (2017 – on food sovereignty),
- Fellahin (2014 – on small farmers’ resistance),
- Gabes Labess (2014 – on the environment) and
- Green Mirages (2012 – on development models and impoverishment).
In 2017, Ayeb and other comrades created the “Observatory of Food Sovereignty and Environment – OSAE” (https://osae-marsad.org), a non-governmental organization (NGO) based in Tunis.