On Assignment for Eye 2 Eye Global, I travelled to Ghana in the northern region in a place called Tamale. Tamale is known for its high quality Organic Shea Butter. I was excited to learn how shea nuts are harvested, washed, sorted, dried, roasted, crushed, churned, purified and finally filtered. This is was exciting for me because i, myself i have been using Shea Butter daily as full body cosmetic.
Shea Butter has come as a gold mine to the women of Tamale and northern Ghana in general. Lives are being transformed by this indigenous nuts that for a long time were left to waste. The women of Tamale, out of their curiosity and innovation introduced to the world shea butter, even though it had existed for a very long time but not for any economic use.
Shea Butter has high concentration of triterpene and cinnamate, all which have been proven to be chemo preventive and anti-inflammatory. Women in Tamale have been producing and using Shea Butter for decades. It is a tradition taught from one generation to another.
It is said that "Men own the land and Women own the Trees" Therefore it is a responsibility of Women to harvest and produce shea butter from the shea nuts collected. In this collection of images i want to portray the strength and tenacity of women in Tamale who are producing the best shea butter the world has ever seen.
Ghana, the country where Tamale is, is the largest exporter of unrefined Shea butter and it exports up to 30, 000 tonnes of shea butter valued currently at USD $ 66 million, this is according to CBI (Reference) This huge financial revenue reflects to the community of Tamale. Not long ago, this region was impoverished with families not having enough money to cater for basic needs such as food, shelter and even education.
Women joined forces in form of Cooperatives and took what was considered a traditional product processed it on international standards to the point now Shea Butter's healthy benefits are known to the world. Here are some known benefits; Shea Butter works as an emollient as it softens and hydrates the skin. This softening and hydration is made possible because shea butter contains palmitic, stearic, oleic and linoleic acids, all which are very rare.
