BECOME A FAN
FOLLOW US
Ajddigue Women's Argan Cooperative Summary
Village of Tidzi, Morocco: Ajddigue Women's Argan Cooperative
Dr. Zoubida Charrouf founded the Ajddigue Women's Argan Cooperative in 1997 outside the city of Essouira in southwestern Morocco to mechanize the production of argan oil, one of the world's rarer oils. Extracted from the nut of the argan tree, this oil has been used in Moroccan cooking for centuries, and is traditionally harvested by women. Known for its healing properties, it is rich in vitamin E, and has more recently been sought after for use in the cosmetics industry. Dr. Charrouf's aim in founding the cooperative was to broaden the market for the region's specialized resource, and in creating a greater demand for the oil, the cooperative would provide employment opportunities to local women while protecting groves of argan trees. With help from the Canadian and Japanese embassies, Ajdigue started with 16 members, and became the first company to commercially produce argan oil. It was also the first argan cooperative to introduce mechanized production of the product. Today, the cooperative is 60 women strong with six staff members. The business focuses on oil extraction, a labor-intensive and low-yield process. The cooperative's annual output is five to eight tons of oil. With their impressive yield, Ajddigue makes organic argan products for fair trade.
Always with an eye to their three main goals-- economic success, social responsibility, and ecological improvement-- the cooperative has driven up the market price of argan oil, implemented a compulsory literacy program for all of its members, and continues to plant new argan trees. As the region continues to face drought, the population of argan trees on which the cooperative depends is seriously threatened. Their efforts to protect existing groves and plant new trees is vital to the region.
“Our biggest strength,” says Madame Zahra Kenabou, Ajddigue’s general manager, “is the fact that we are a real cooperative with a sound social and ecological mission. Our cooperative is also economically viable and shows how rural women can be agents of development themselves. We have learned that the best way to survive is by fostering a culture of cooperatives that shares a socially conscious model of development and creates a network of support.” In rural Morocco, where only a third of the women are literate, and where men were traditionally responsible for marketing argan oil, Ajddigue sets a ground-breaking example.
"Women in the Ajddigue cooperative are not mere workers, or housewives doing what they have traditionally done for free," notes Kenabou. "They are full members and they collectively own the cooperative and share in its profits. That gives them a strong sense of ownership of their labor, of the products of their labor, and of the income this generates.”
