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Post: Morocco: How does argan oil protect the climate?

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Climate protection that also benefits poor locals. An example from Morocco shows how this works: There is a cooperative of 50 women producing sustainable argan oil.


“The tree is a treasure”, sing to the women and show how the argan fruits are harvested. However, after they fall, they are lifted from the ground because the tree is too dense and prickly to be plucked. Women take their songs very seriously because they live from argan wood.

They all come from the Drarga area near Agadir and work in the “Thighanimine El Baz” cooperative. Khadija Zaakuk is one of them. He says he learned to read and write here after his divorce. She now has a stable income, can pay for her son’s education and take care of her family.

The Argan trees were almost gone.

“Women can build houses and buy clothes for their children,” Fatima Eddaroui says with a smile. “And we work here in the fresh air.”

It’s not an issue, of course. Since argan oil has a tradition in the southwest of the country, the argan tree, which only grows here, was nearly extinct by 1990.

“People had forgotten the value of the argan tree,” explains Kaoutar El Rhaffouli, an expert at the German Association for International Cooperation (GIZ) in Morocco.

At the time, it was believed that intensive agriculture – fruits and vegetables for export – was more important.

Kaoutar El Rhaffouli, GIZ

For this reason, and due to the increasingly drying climate, it has increasingly disappeared. Only then did you realize how valuable a solid tree is. Forests are habitats for plants, insects and birds.

Argan as a bulwark against desertification

Argan trees have deep roots. They collect water and keep it in the soil. “This stabilizes the soil against erosion and also maintains its fertility,” says the GIZ expert.


Argan berries on the tree

This makes the trees a bulwark against advancing desertification. They also absorb the greenhouse gas CO2 from the air and store carbon for centuries.

Therefore, in the 1990s, a major reforestation took place, again with the help of Germany.

And in 1998, we managed to get the argan tree’s ‘biosphere reserve’ status from UNESCO.

Kaoutar El Rhaffouli, GIZ

2.5 million hectares of forest are under protection, an area larger than Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania. This includes the forest where cooperative women harvest.

A lot of manual labor in the production of argan oil

The process of making argan oil is complex: the pulp is manually extracted, the seeds are cracked open, and the seed flakes are removed. Only then do the machines come into play. You are grinding the tiles. Finally, the mass is pressed until the valuable oil is extracted.


argan oil production

And it sells well now – as a cosmetic product for the skin. In a variant where the seed flakes are roasted, it is popular almost everywhere as a cooking oil. A success story from GIZ’s point of view. On behalf of the federal government, he not only engaged in afforestation, but also founded the Thighanimine cooperative.

Hundreds of jobs earned through reforestation

456 women currently work there and in seven subsidiary cooperatives. Besides argan oil, they also make, for example, couscous, honey and fig oil. Kaoutar El Rhaffouli believes that the model of creating value for local people when it comes to climate and environmental protection works well elsewhere in the world. “With other local products and plant species.”

A few days ago, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change called for significantly more cooperation between rich and poor countries on climate protection. Climate researcher at the Alfred Wegener Institute (AWI) and member of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Hans-Otto Pörtner explains that many of them don’t even have the resources to “correctly position themselves in the face of climate change, adapt.” .

Pörtner: “A limited time frame” for a future worth living

Therefore, it is now important to ensure that developing countries position themselves sustainably, including through technology and know-how transfer.

We have a limited window of time to ensure a livable future for nature on this earth for future generations. And the responsibility lies with today’s generation.

Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change member Prof. Hans-Otto Portner

The women of Drarga are already working on this with sustainable oil production. And they take advantage of it. They want to be one with the Argan tree forever. At least that’s what they say in their song during the harvest.

Mark Hugo is an editor in the ZDF environmental department.

Source: ZDF

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