PRICKLY PEAR

For decades, there has been an ancestral secret among Moroccan elders and healers on how to reduce scars, regenerate cells and restore skin tissue on the face and skin. But today it has become a reality, demonstrated by researchers and scientists. It is the prickly pear.

It is harvested every year in Morocco all over the country during the summer. It contains a magic oil obtained by cold pressing of the seeds which is very rich in vitamin E and essential fatty acids with antioxidant and anti-radical properties and other therapeutic uses. It takes about a ton of figs to obtain a litre of oil whose price is around 12,000 dhs or about 1100 euros.

Having become an essential crop, the cactus producing this prickly pear is cultivated and planted in certain regions of the south by women's cooperatives in order to harvest these magic seeds to produce this oil which is marketed for cosmetics worldwide.

In addition, during the season, smallholders come into town with barrows loaded with these fruits and sell them to passers-by. They are consumed on the spot - people rarely buy a bagful to take home. Moroccans say that each individual fruit is different, each has its own flavour and consistency. 

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