Journal of Environmental Protection, 2016, 7, 1473-1482 http://www.scirp.org/journal/jep ISSN Online: 2152-2219 ISSN Print: 2152-2197 DOI: 10.4236/jep.2016.711124 October 13, 2016 Environmental Impact of Mining Exploitation: A Case Study of Some Mines of Barite in the Eastern Anti-Atlas of Morocco Abdelhafid Essalhi, Mourad Essalhi, Abdeslam Toummite Equipe de Recherche: Géophysique, Géoressources et Patrimoine (ER-GGP), Département de Géologie, Faculté des Sciences et Techniques, Errachidia, Maroc Abstract Extraction of mineral resources is the backbone of the national economy in many developed and developing countries of the world. However, the exploitation can have many negative impacts on the immediate environment of the exploitation sites. In this study performed on some mining areas of the Moroccan Anti-Atlas, four prin- cipal negative effects were detected: effect on the physiognomy, on safety, on health, and on recovery rate. The principal source of this situation is the exploitation of the ore deposits from top to bottom without using any geological preparation and the use of non-adapted exploitation technics. To minimize these impacts, we propose to establish a geological study and advanced mining exploration before starting exploi- tation, and follow an exploitation technic well adapted to the morphology of the ore deposit like cut-and-fill mining and sublevel stoping methods. Keywords Negative Impacts, Environment, Exploitation, Physiognomy, Anti-Atlas 1. Introduction In the last times, the world had experienced several and rapid changes in population habits and it knew more technological innovations. These technological changes occur with a great and increasing speed. Human development is accompanied with increasing How to cite this paper: Essalhi, A., Essalhi, M. and Toummite, A. (2016) Environmen- tal Impact of Mining Exploitation: A Case Study of Some Mines of Barite in the East- ern Anti-Atlas of Morocco. Journal of En- vironmental Protection, 7, 1473-1482. http://dx.doi.org/10.4236/jep.2016.711124 Received: July 30, 2016 Accepted: October 10, 2016 Published: October 13, 2016 Copyright © 2016 by authors and Scientific Research Publishing Inc. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution International License (CC BY 4.0). http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Open Access