Niagalé Camara bends down and places the nuts in a basin. With colleagues from her cooperative near Bamako in Mali, she is preparing to transform the product into a highly prized vegetable oil, shea butter.
Shea, a tree that grows only in Africa, and whose fruit is harvested almost exclusively by women, appears to be a real instrument of development in some of the poorest countries in the world.
According to the Global Shea Alliance (AGK), sixteen million African women from Senegal to South Sudan live or survive from its harvest, mainly in rural areas. Mali is one of the world’s leading producers, along with Nigeria and Burkina Faso.
Demand for the product, used in particular in food (chocolate, biscuits) and cosmetics (creams), has exploded in recent years, driven by Western consumers, who are increasingly eager to buy products presented as organic and natural.
But the women of the cooperative of shea butter producers in the rural commune of Siby (COOPROKASI), despite a work organization that has become more professional since its birth in 2003, are struggling to take advantage of this windfall.
Nearly 1,000 women work there. Permanent employees earn the equivalent of the minimum wage each month, around 45,000 CFA francs (70 euros). Temporary workers are paid by the task.
“One of the advantages of the cooperative is that it has enabled women to have jobs” all seasons, whereas their activity was limited to the rainy season before, underlines Filfing Koumaré, the sales manager.
Step by step, they transform the product. They shell it to extract the almond, which is then crushed, washed, dried several times and then cooked in a pot until a blackish liquid is obtained.
It remains to filter and remove the impurities, and obtain the final oil, shea butter, which will be used to design soaps and ointments, sold in the village, in Bamako and to customers all over the world, according to Kamissoko Kinimba Niara , accountant at the cooperative.
“When the women make their sales, they earn an income allowing them a little financial autonomy”, affirms Assitan Kone Camara, president of the cooperative. “But one of the difficulties is the lack of support and the lack of means”.
For Daouda Keita, mayor of the town, “it is crucial to support this structure to modernize it”. Its managers are asking for training and financial support, particularly for marketing.