What Runs on Nuts and Saves Labor ?

"Wonder Mill' May be Answer to West African Women's Prayers"

Agence france Presse
ABIDJAN, Ivory Coast - It crushes, grinds and shreds, it saws, drills and welds, it pumps water and generates power, it runs on nuts and it is changing the way of life in 35 villages in one of the poorest regions in the world.

The « multipurpose platform of equipment and machinery », currently on display outside a luxury hotel and conference center in Ivory Coast’s economic capital, Abidjan, has been heralded, rather less clumsily, as a wonder mill.

Developed in association with the International Fund for Agricultural Development and the UN Industrial Development Organization, the mill is improving the lot of hundreds of women in Mali and Burkina Faso.

As the machine, which costs $6,000, is put through its paces with a variety of primary foodstuffs – millet, sorghum and rice – its Swiss inventor enthusiastically extols its « revolutionary » virtues during a conference on African industrialization.

« What with carrying water, and grinding and milling cereals,» said the inventor, Roman Imboden, « the work of an African woman is exhausting ».

« Women are tired of pounding », said a woman from Mali as she mimed the repetitive task of milling with her two fists rising and falling. With the wonder mill, she said, « it takes five minutes to do a job that used to take an hour ».

The machine’s main application is food processing : it crushes peanuts and the seeds of the shea tree, it hulls rice, maize and sorghum, and it generates enough electricity to light an entire village. An electric water pump is easily attached.

The wonder mill’s engine was originally designed to run on diesel fuel, but has since been modified to allow oil from indigenous Jatropha curcas nuts to be used as a fuel.

Jatropha curcas had served mainly as a natural form of fencing for animal enclosures. Its oil is also used to make soap.

Now actors tour villages in the Sahel region, performing sketches to explain how, when crushed in the wonder mill, the nuts can be used to fuel it.

« Three hectares of this plant will run the engine for 30 years, » Mr. Imboden said.

Made in India, the wonder mill made its debut in Mali in December 1993. Since then, demand has been overwhelming, and many are already in use in neighboring Burkina Faso, say its promoters.