Meet the Moroccan Women Making Argan Oil for the Beauty Industry

Argan oil bottles are displayed for sale inside the showroom of Women's Agricultural Cooperative Taitmatine, in Agadir, Morocco June 8, 2021. Picture taken June 8, 2021. (Reuters)
Argan oil bottles are displayed for sale inside the showroom of Women's Agricultural Cooperative Taitmatine, in Agadir, Morocco June 8, 2021. Picture taken June 8, 2021. (Reuters)
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Meet the Moroccan Women Making Argan Oil for the Beauty Industry

Argan oil bottles are displayed for sale inside the showroom of Women's Agricultural Cooperative Taitmatine, in Agadir, Morocco June 8, 2021. Picture taken June 8, 2021. (Reuters)
Argan oil bottles are displayed for sale inside the showroom of Women's Agricultural Cooperative Taitmatine, in Agadir, Morocco June 8, 2021. Picture taken June 8, 2021. (Reuters)

In the arid mountains of southern Morocco, local women harvest argan oil, a natural product they have long used in cooking but which has become highly prized by the global beauty industry as an anti-aging skin treatment and restorative for hair.

Most argan oil is produced by local cooperatives of Amazigh-speaking Berber women around the cities of Agadir, Essaouira and Taroudant where the argan tree, which bears small green fruit resembling an olive, is common.

For centuries the oil, among the most expensive in the world, has been extracted by drying argan fruit in the sun, peeling and mashing the fruit then crushing and grinding the kernel with stones.

The oil was traditionally used as a flavoring and a savory dip for bread. As an ingredient it is still common in Morocco and now also exported for food.

Its use as a beauty product has created a surge in demand for the oil by international cosmetics companies, however. It also means that local groups are investing in more appealing packaging. The oil now costs around $30-50 a liter locally, but can sell on the international market in smaller high-end bottles for up to $250 a liter.

In the Tiout oasis near Taroudant (600km south of Rabat), the Taitmatine cooperative employs 100 women to produce argan oil, offering them a salary, free childcare, health insurance and literacy courses.

The cooperative, whose name in Amazigh means “sisters”, was set up in 2002.

Although new machines they use to help process the fruit have helped speed up the work, the women still have to remove the hard shell of the kernels by hand by pounding it with a stone, before the inner kernel can be pressed by a machine to extract the oil.

“It takes up to three days of grinding for every woman to get one liter of Argan oil,” said Mina Ait Taleb, head of the Taitmatin cooperative.

“We work here but we also have fun and sing together,” said Zahra Haqqi speaking in a room where dozens of women were grinding outer argan kernels using stones.

Haqi said the job had helped her earn a regular income.



Elitist No More, Caviar is Turning Casual

Many caviar producers are embracing the trend. GEORGES GOBET / AFP
Many caviar producers are embracing the trend. GEORGES GOBET / AFP
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Elitist No More, Caviar is Turning Casual

Many caviar producers are embracing the trend. GEORGES GOBET / AFP
Many caviar producers are embracing the trend. GEORGES GOBET / AFP

When Burger King announced it was selling caviar with nuggets at its French restaurants on April 1, many people assumed it was an April Fool's joke.

But as news spread on social media, buyers rushed to try one of the world's most expensive delicacies paired with a humble and highly commoditized piece of deep-fried chicken while limited stocks lasted, said AFP.

For 19 euros ($22), they got seven nuggets, mayonnaise and a 10-gram (0.35-ounce) pouch of Chinese-origin caviar from the Astana brand, which explained it had worked with the fast-food giant to "make the caviar of chefs available to as many people as possible".

It was a marketing coup -- the story quickly went viral after being picked up by French news outlets -- but it also revealed how the image of caviar as an out-of-reach luxury product is rapidly changing.

As with most new food trends, interest in the exclusive fish eggs is being driven by online influencers and celebrities.

Rihanna posted a video to her 150 million followers on Instagram on December 20 last year showing her eating nuggets topped with caviar.

"I don't like how much I like this," she began.

US celebrity chef David Chang is also a champion, with a 2022 Instagram video showing him dunking a deep-fried chicken leg into a one-kilogram tin of caviar -- "one of my favorite most obscene things to do" -- which racked up more than three million views.

He credits New York chef Wylie Dufresne with first adding it to the menu at his influential WD~50 restaurant in the 2010s.

Last year, the US Open tennis tournament caused a stir by selling a $100 box of six nuggets with caviar created by the luxury Manhattan fried chicken restaurant Coqodaq.

'Less formal'

Producers and food writers have mixed feelings about the popularization of the culinary indulgence, which sells for 1,000 to 30,000 euros a kilogram depending on the type.

The high prices are due to rarity and the high investment producers make in the sturgeon fish needed for caviar, which start to produce eggs only after eight or 10 years.

The most expensive caviar -- the one famously preferred by Hollywood star Elizabeth Taylor -- is the roe of the beluga sturgeon, which takes at least 15 years to mature.

Mikael Petrossian, head of the French brand Petrossian, said there was a "demystification" of caviar underway.

"Caviar doesn't necessarily have to come in a large tin with silver serving pieces... You can enjoy the product in a much more relaxed way," he said. "I personally like eating caviar with crisps."

The founder of French caviar producer Neuvic, Laurent Deverlanges, says his company also aims to make it "less formal".

He posted a review of the "King Nugget Caviar" menu online, concluding that "it works, even if you can't really taste the caviar much".

But Olivier Cabarrot, the head of the France-based Prunier brand whose caviar restaurant is one of the most famous in the world, pushes back on the idea of it becoming a regular product.

"In terms of gastronomy, there is nothing as expensive. It's hard to talk about it becoming 'democratised'," he said. "But we can speak of greater accessibility, achieved through the sale of smaller quantities rather than lower prices."

Many distributors including Petrossian and Prunier offer tins of 10, 20 or 30 grams, helping to attract a younger clientele.

Dreamy

Remi Dechambre, a food journalist at Le Parisien newspaper, said people associated caviar with opulence and refinement less and less.

"We've completely moved on from that... Consumption has become a little more common, a little less formal -- even though it still makes people dream," he told AFP.

But knowing how to enjoy the product properly remains essential, said Francoise Boisseaud, managing director of the supplier Le Comptoir du Caviar.

"There's a whole education to be done," she said about the different types -- baeri, oscietre, sevruga or beluga .

For her, the best way to enjoy it is with a crusty baguette and butter, not with fried chicken or crisps.

Robin Panfili, a food journalist who runs the food blog "Entree, Plat, Dessert", said Burger King had pulled off a "marketing trick".

"By trying to bring together two worlds that are completely opposed -- luxury and fast food -- the aim is to shake up the codes, to demystify a product historically seen as luxurious and elitist. It's visual, it's viral, it sparks discussion because it's provocative," he told AFP.