In Morocco, women's cooperatives are victims of the global appetite for argan oil

For more than two decades, argan oil, known as “ liquid gold ,” has enjoyed growing popularity due to its moisturizing and restorative properties. The oil is used in high-end cosmetics and food.

But beyond its uses, the argan tree also has great cultural importance for local populations, notes the Moroccan site Yabiladi . Symbolizing ancestral know-how that is passed down from generation to generation, this tree has sustained life in the arid hills for centuries, feeding people and preventing desertification of the land.

However, the appetite of international cosmetic companies for this oil has led to overexploitation of forests, while overgrazing is weakening cultivable areas, reports The Independent . Thus, despite the intensification of harvests, fruit yields are constantly declining. To make matters worse, climate change is disrupting the cycle of fruit growth and flowering, which is occurring later and later each year, points out TelQuel . As a result, argan forests, which covered around 14,000 km ² at the beginning of the ^21st century, have shrunk by 40%.

Interviewed by The Independent , chemist Zoubida Charrouf stated: “The disappearance of the argan trees, which have long acted as a green curtain protecting a large part of southern Morocco against the advance of the Sahara, is considered an ecological catastrophe.”

Especially since Morocco also has to deal with economic problems: the argan industry is dominated by a few foreign multinationals, jeopardizing the sustainability of the sector, reports TelQuel .

For example, Olvea, a French multinational, controls 70% of the export market. This near-monopoly situation is driving up prices: a kilogram of Afyach (a variety of argan), which cost between 2 and 4 dirhams (between 20 and 40 euro cents) in 2000, now fluctuates between 13 and 15 dirhams (between 1.2 and 1.5 euros).

“Because the fruit is scarce, women’s argan cooperatives can no longer afford to buy the raw materials. Only large international companies can obtain them. Several cooperatives have therefore ceased all activity this year,” she laments. the head of a cooperative in the province of Essaouira quoted by TelQuel .

Even the smallest cooperatives that manage to sell their produce see their profits captured by intermediaries. As Jamila Id Bourrous, director of the Union of Women's Arganeraie Cooperatives, explains to The Independent : " Between the villager and the final buyer, there are four intermediaries. Each takes a commission. The cooperatives don't have the means to store, so they sell at a low price to someone who pays in advance. "

Faced with this problem, the government has attempted to build storage centers to help producers preserve their products over time; without apparent success, according to the cooperatives. The first victims are the female workers in the cooperatives, who struggle to earn the Moroccan minimum wage, set at 3,111 dirhams (288 euros).

This dispossession is also symbolic, analyses TelQuel, which points out that argan oil is used by many cosmetic brands without any mention of its origin, like the Israeli brand Moroccanoil, which does not indicate the origin of the product, either on its packaging or on its website.

This invisibility is reinforced by the lack of international legal protection. In May 2015, Morocco filed an application to this effect, with a view to obtaining a Protected Geographical Indication (PGI) label – this certification attests to the quality of the product in relation to its place of production. But for the time being, TelQuel points out, the name “argan” benefits from no international protection, “ giving free rein to all forms of appropriation, dilution, and commercial misappropriation .”

According to Hafida El-Hantati, owner of one of the cooperatives cited by The Independent , the problems facing the argan trees are a sign of a deeper upheaval: “I am the last generation to have lived our traditions – weddings, births, even the production of oil. All of that is fading away.”