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When fully grown, the plant resembles something from The Day of the Triffids or some other science-fiction creation: a squat succulent with thick, spiky arms, purple fleshy petals and seedpods like rhino horns.
Hoodia gordonii is no beauty, but this humble plant is Africa's latest cash crop, priced almost like a narcotic at $40 an ounce. The plant, which grows wild in the Kalahari Desert of southern Africa, was once used by indigenous tribes to suppress hunger and thirst when hunting. Now, it's such a darling of the international dieting industry that an Internet search for the word gets about 14 million responses.
The resulting demand is so hot, wild supplies have been severely compromised, smuggling is rife and farmers in southern Africa are trying to get in on the game. "You start doing the sums; it's too good to be true. You want to throw your calculator away. It's an impossible phenomenon," hoodia farmer Dougal Bassingthwaighte said.
With international giant Unilever licensed to commercialize hoodia and international demand far outstripping supply, there's a mad race on to get plants to the market.
Bassingthwaighte, 65, who is farming hoodia with his son, Kirk, has 130,000 seedlings being planted out from his nursery, where they begin as tiny green sprouts, to his fields. In about two years, when he plans to harvest them, each is likely to weigh about 4 pounds. He hopes to have a million plants next year.
But the explosion of interest has not only put enormous pressure on the rare plant, listed as an endangered species by international treaty, it also puts intense pressure on an embryonic market that could be a boon for Africans if it could grow at a natural and sustainable pace.
The craze seems to bring out the worst in people. The industry is rife with fierce competitive secrecy, quack products and illegal harvesting. Next, authorities in South Africa fear, comes the inevitable interest of organized gangsters.
Whether hoodia works as a diet aid has not been proved scientifically. Pills and capsules claiming to contain hoodia are widely available in the United States online and at stores that sell herbal supplements. Such products are largely exempt from U.S. government regulations that require drugs to be tested for safety and effectiveness before being sold.
But Bassingthwaighte says he has no doubt.
"I grew up with it. I actually ate it as a kid. I know the stuff works," he said. As a farm boy he often walked or rode in the heat to other farms. "And people said, 'Eat this. It will take away your hunger and thirst.' And it did."
Back then, it never occurred to anyone to farm the plant.
Three types contain the active ingredient P57: hoodia gordonii, the most common, which has a bitter taste; the similar-looking hoodia currorii; and hoodia officianalis, a smaller and rarer plant, preferred by indigenous Namibian tribes because it tastes sweeter. Bassingthwaighte sees the last as having potential as an organically farmed salad vegetable.
South Africa's Council for Scientific and Industrial Research isolated and identified P57 and patented it in 1996, later licensing British firm Phytofarm to develop and commercialize it. The council argues that anyone who sells hoodia as a weight-reduction product outside that license would infringe on the patent.
In 1998, Pfizer signed a deal to develop the product but withdrew in 2003; a year later, Unilever entered a licensing deal with Phytofarm. Under legal pressure from lawyers representing the San tribesmen, Phytofarm later signed a royalty deal with them.
South Africa is the only African country exporting hoodia legally. Paul Gildenhuys of the Western Cape Conservation Authority said the amount of hoodia exported to Europe and the U.S. under permit from that province more than doubled in the past year from 22 tons to 49 tons, raising suspicions that significant smuggling was going on. He said there were reports of hoodia flowing through Western Cape province from other parts of South Africa or other countries.
"The problem with the industry is that people are all trying to get their part of the cake," he said.
Source: Robyn Dixon, from azcentral.com |
