The shea-butter
from the nilotic shea-butter tree is different from
that of the West African varieties in that it is
higher in olein, which contains most of the therapeutic
substances found in shea-butter. Nilotica shea-butter
is softer and more fragrant than West African shea-butters,
and this high-value product gives Ugandan women farmers
over five times the amount received by their West
African counterparts
In West Africa, sheanut and shea-butter prices are
set by large multinational corporations which 'took
over' the shea market following the colonial era. In
Uganda, the price of shea products is set by the farmers
themselves, based on the actual value of shea products
to the farmers who produce it and by Ugandan consumers
- prices on the traditional market are about double
those of West Africa for both sheanut and shea-butter.
By reinforcing the economic value of the shea-butter
tree through expanded markets, the Shea Project has
received an enthusiastic response from participating
farmers, who have become serious about protection of
shea woodland - and serious as well about production
of the finest quality shea-butter at a premium price.
Rebuilding Lives and Livelihoods
in Northern Uganda: The Shea Project 2008-2012
Introduction
As a natural resource controlled by women, the Shea
Butter Tree Vitellaria paradoxa supports the
nutritional and economic health of rural families and
sustains indigenous plant and animal biodiversity.
This wild and slow-growing savannah tree provides food
(nutritious fruit as well as food oil), and revenues
from the sale of its annual bounty help rural households
to feed themselves, to invest in livestock and other
income-generating forms of wealth, to and meet cash
requirements including shelter, clothing, health care,
taxes, school fees, school uniforms and school books.
As peace returns to northern Uganda, where well over
a million people have been violently dislocated from
their former lives and communities for years, the shea
tree comprises a unique resource for rebuilding the
lives and livelihoods of rural farmers now returning
to their villages.
Background
The Shea
Project for Local Conservation and Development began
between and 1992 in Otuke County, Lira District,
an initiative of the Cooperative Office for Voluntary
Organizations (COVOL), a US 501 (c) (3) non-profit non-governmental
organization.
The project received funding from USAID from 1995
to 1997, with an expansion phase from 1998 to 2002
funded by USAID, the McKnight Foundation, and the EU
INCO program, expanding it area of activity across
northern and northeastern Uganda, including the districts
of Lira, Pader, Katakwi (now Katakwi and Amuria), Kotido
(now Abim), Gulu (now Gulu and Amuru) and Kitgum.
The Shea Project works in partnership with the Northern
Uganda Shea Processors Association (NUSPA), established
under the project in 1997, which is a women-managed
producer cooperative comprised of over 2000 producers
from over 50 producer groups.
From 2002
to 2006, security conditions in northern Uganda deteriorated
drastically, and all NUSPA members and their communities
were obliged to flee their communities for the relative
safety (and squalor) of the larger towns and military
camps for residence of these ‘Internally
Displaced Persons’ (IDPs).
Accordingly, the Shea Project field offices were closed,
and all processing equipment relocated to the Lira
project office where production continued to the extent
that shea nut could be gathered from the war zone which
had overtaken the production areas and villages of
the NUSPA producers.
During this period, thousands of slow-growing shea
trees were cut by highly organized charcoal traders,
allegedly often using military vehicles to transport
their product to urban markets, resulting in considerable
damage to the integrity and sustainability of the shea
resource in some areas.
Despite these very difficult conditions, in 2006 the
Shea Project and NUSPA were able to establish an organic
production system and obtained organic certification
under USDA-NOP and EEC 2092/91 regulations.
During 2007, much of the displaced population of northern
Uganda has now returned to rebuild their abandoned
villages from the towns and IDP camps to which they
were displaced over the most of the past 5 years.
Beyond Program: Building on Social Capital
in Returnee Communities
Beyond the financial revenues to NUSPA members from
the sale of their shea butter production, it is impossible
to overstate the social benefits to local communities
provided by such an integrated and decentralized approach
to rural livelihoods development for rural women and
their families.
While the current NUSPA member groups were all pre-existing
(their established history thus indicating long-term
viability), new groups have always been formed be neighboring
communities based on the inspiration provided by the
benefits accruing to the members of these existing
groups.
Benefits
are not only financial (or nutritional) in nature;
the project has long observed the great enjoyment
of producers coming together, both within and between
member groups, for group meetings and other social
events (some lasting long into the night), particularly
as NUSPA brings together women and men of several
distinct ethnicities and language groups which would
never otherwise have occasion to meet and to develop ‘cross-cultural’ friendships
and business partnerships.
These exchanges provide not only a means of entertainment
and enjoyment, but also provide a forum for extension
of important social initiatives including education
on aspects of civil society such as voting rights,
and health issues such as pre-natal care, nutrition
and protection from water-borne diseases and HIV/AIDS.
The Shea Resource
The Shea Butter Tree (Vitellaria paradoxa,syn. Butyrospermum
paradoxum) is a nutritional and economic resource
of great importance across 16 countries of sub-Saharan
Africa, a slow-growing and wild savannah fruit tree
indigenous to a narrow band of parkland extending
from Senegal to Uganda.
Across
Africa, it is women who traditionally harvest shea
fruit (an important nutritional resource in and of
itself, as it ripens and falls from the tree during
the annual ‘hungry season’,
when food stocks are lowest and agricultural requirements
are highest, in clearing land and planting crops
with the coming of the rains).
The shea
resource is the domain of women because within the
household they are traditionally responsible for
gathering of non-agricultural products (e.g. wild
fruits), and also because processing the shea nuts
into butter is considered women’s work, like most household
food processing activities. Very significantly, and
unlike most cash-crops, women control the revenues
from the sale of shea butter – which they use
to care for the cash needs of their households and
families.
It is widely
recognized across Africa – and
in northern Uganda in particular - that while men often
use their money in selfish pursuits, meat and liquor
etc. - women use their income primarily if not exclusively
to care for their households. This includes investing
in livestock, cultivation and a wide range of income-generating
activities. Women are thus the real engines of local
economic development, which is what makes shea butter
such a very important resource for rural communities
across Africa.
While the nilotica subspecies of the shea tree (Vitellaria
paradoxa subspecies nilotica) is found
only in the eastern part of the range – Uganda,
South Sudan and Ethiopia – the Ugandan variety
is very distinct in its composition, being much softer
and smoother, with a gentler scent than the Sudanese
or Ethiopian varieties. The Ugandan variety is also
genetically unique, as proven by recent studies carried
out by the French research institute CIRAD from 1998
to 2003.
Ripe shea
fruits fall from the tree – in Uganda,
from April through June – and are harvested
before sunrise by rural women. Children sometimes help,
before school. The fruit pulp is nutritious and a very
important source of calories, vitamins and minerals
during the annual ‘hungry season’ when
food stocks are lowest, yet food energy is desperately
needed to support the labor requirements of cultivation.
Inside the seed (nut) is a kernel which is dried and
stored for subsequent processing and extraction of
shea butter.
The fruits not eaten during collection are brought
home, where the pulp is removed (by eating or removal
to make dried fruit preserves, a traditional delicacy)
and the fresh nuts laid out on woven mats in the sun
to dry.
After a
few days of sun-drying (and protection from the rain),
the shell of the nut is cracked and removed, and
the shea kernel inside is sun-dried for another 4
or 5 days, then stored in traditional granaries (or,
for NUSPA’s certified
organic production system, in food-grade jute bags).
Stored properly, the dried stored nuts may be kept
for over a year.
The dried kernels are put twice through a motorized
grinding machine, first to break them and a second
time to yield a fine powder. The powder is mixed with
a small amount of clean boiling water and packed into
new cloth bags, which are pressed to yield the oil.
Aside from the disruptions brought by the war, The
NUSPA women involved in the Shea Project are fundamentally
farmers, rural women raising farming households. As
such, they depend on cultivation, and not a cash economy,
to raise and sustain their families. Other income-generating
activities include making clay pots, for instance -
but their production and marketing of certified organic
shea butter through the Shea Project is vastly more
profitable than those other activities (making pots
might bring in a dollar or two a day, making shea butter
$100).
While we
would never want the NUSPA members to become dependent
on any sort of export-oriented activity for their
survival, the income provided by access to international
markets offers these women a unique opportunity to
greatly (and quantifiably) improve their lives and
living standards of their families – in terms
of nutrition, education, medical care and investment
of their income from sales of organic shea butter in
profitable enterprises.
Beyond
the socio-economic benefits to producers from their
production and sale of shea butter, the Shea Project
has resulted in conservation of this indigenous woodland
(objectively verifiable by sampling methods) by providing
more profitable opportunities for marketing of shea
butter which offer a positive and very tangible economic
incentive serve to protect the living tree – and
the plant and animal biodiversity which it supports
- across whole landscapes.
Contact :
Eliot Masters, Project Coordinator
PO Box 6908 Kampala, Uganda
Email:
Tel. +256 75 374 1616 (Uganda)
Tel. +254 733 729 612 (Nairobi)
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