Cactus bears fruit for Morocco

Late summer sees carts full of prickly pears for sale in the Fez Medina. You won't find this humble fruit in the supermarkets, but it only costs a few dirhams to have the vendor peel away the prickly skin and for you to taste the refreshing flesh. It seems, though, that el hindia, as the prickly pear is known in Moroccan Arabic, might contain more than meets the eye. Helen Ranger reports.


The BBC website reports today that women in the Sbouya hamlet near Sidi Ifni in the south of Morocco are harvesting the fruit of the prickly pear cactus (of the genus opuntia) for much more important reasons than selling them on market stalls. The cactus, previously eaten as fruit or used for animal feed, is creating a minor economic miracle in the region, thanks to new health and cosmetic products that are extracted.

Every local family has its own plot and, with backing from the Ministry of Agriculture, there's a scheme to transform small-scale production into a significant industry. Dh12m has been pledged to build a state-of-the-art factory that will help local farmers process the ripe fruits. The move is expected to help workers keep pace with the requirements of the French cosmetics industry which is using the cactus in increasing numbers of products.

Izana Marzouqi, a 55-year-old member of the Aknari co-operative, says people from the region grew up with the cactus and did not realise its true benefit.

"Demand for cactus products has grown and that it is because the plant is said to help with high blood pressure and cancer. The co-operative I belong to earns a lot of money selling oil from the seeds to make anti-ageing face cream," she said.

Each member of the Aknari co-operative can pick between 30 and 50 pallets of the fruit in a morning during the season, which lasts from July to December. Many of them also work in the factory nearby, where the fruit is peeled, the pulp separated and used to make jam. It's the seeds which are ground to produce an oil that is the most lucrative benefit of the plant. The oil is used in more than forty cosmetic products, and sells at a very high price as a pure skin oil.

It takes approximately one tonne of the tiny seeds to make a litre of oil. The leaves are ground into a powder; the flowers flavour vinegar, and the pulp of the fruit has been found to lower cholesterol. There's not much left over for animal feed, these days.

Keltoum Hammadi, who runs the Aknari co-operative, says that some of the processes are secret.

"In the cosmetics industry, rivals never let the competition know their sources," says Hammadi. "All I can say is that we are working with a number of European laboratories to develop the use of the cactus for slimming."

Keltoum Achahour, manager of Saharacactus in the Sidi Ifni area, explains that her company is collaborating on other new products.

"We are a sort of umbrella for a number of women's co-operatives," she explains. "By forming a group and incorporating, we can protect the cactus, create a brand and ensure we get a fair share of the vast sums of money that the international cosmetics industry spends on research and development."

The industry is expected to grow by more than 20% next year alone. More than half of the land suitable for cactus production has yet to be involved in any commercial activity, and with 9 000 plants per hectare, there's still a lot of room for expansion.

It's also an industry that has won women a lot of freedom. Sayka Hafida, a member of the Aknari co-operative, says that her life has been transformed by this organic, naturally-occurring plant.

"We still use the cactus leftovers for animal feed and we eat the fruit when it is fresh, and dry it for times when the plants don't produce. But I could never have imagined that I could get such a good income from it. You don't have to be educated to work in the factories. Our children are feeling the benefits. There is much more money around and it is women who are earning it."