Last time I was at Nukutatava beach, one of the girls pointed out a kura tree growing right near the shore and I picked some of the green fruit. When the fruit turns yellow or white the women make a potent medicine to cure all sorts of ills. Kura is the Fijian name for noni which grows in many Polynesian countries and is bottled and sold in health food shops. Several of the women in our family make this medicine and are confident that it is excellent for good health.
Peceli spent yesterday down the Macuata coast at Dreketi inspecting a kura plantation as some farmers are considering alternative crops to sugar-cane. To diversify seems the way to go.
The little tree normally grows wild of course.
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Noni juice is huge in the health foods market - you see a lot advertised as either being Tahitian or Hawaiian.
ReplyDeleteIt could prove to be lucrative for Fiji - especially if it grows so well in the wild. Just got to find the right buyer!
A lot of noni juice is marketed in the US. Some is grown in Hawaii and there is quite a bit imported from Tahiti. It does have some very good benefits to offer.
ReplyDeleteBut there is money to be made and so benefitss are "hyped" beyond reason.
Too bad about the hype as natural foods, vitamin supplements, and traditional vegetable based remedies can do much for people and make dangerous but highly profitable pharmaceuticals unnecessary. But exaggerating the benefits works against all this in the long run.