Souq level of municipal administration. The Muhtasib was responsible for supervising business practices and collecting taxes for a given souq while the Arif are the overseers for a specific trade. Shopping at a souq or market place is part of daily life throughout much of the Middle East. Prices are commonly set by bargaining, also known as haggling, between buyers and sellers. In the 18th and 19th centuries, as Europeans began to conquer parts of North Africa and the Levant, an interest in Middle Eastern culture and architecture began to flourish. This interest spawned a genre of literary works and paintings
Education in the Middle East and North Africa despite substantial efforts to build new schools or repair existing ones, classes may meet outdoors. Further attempts at raising literacy rates are being processed in the MENA region with a particular emphasis on educating women in rural areas where the level of illiteracy in general is high especially among females. According to the World Bank report in 1999, in the rural areas of Morocco, only one woman out of ten can read and write. The United Nations Education, Scientific and Cultural Organization reported that over seventy-five million women and forty-five million men across the Middle East and North Africa region