Fruit trees we are looking for
Ackee-Blighia_sapida
Blighia sapida Koenig Ann. Bot. 2: 571 (1806)
Synonym: Cupania edulis Shum & Thonn.
Common names: French: finsanier, sweetbreads. English: akee apple
Local names: Boki: otousi. Ewondo: abai. Foulfouldé: feso. Hausa: gwanja kousa. Ibo: okpou
Origin, geographical distribution and ecology
Probably from the Guinean forests of West Africa; present in the semi-deciduous forests and forest galleries of tropical Africa, from Senegal to Cameroon, Gabon and the islands of Sao Tome and Principe. In Cameroon, it is a rare species found in the post-anthropic forest. It has been introduced in India, America and the Caribbean, including Jamaica.
Description
Tree up to 30 m tall and 80 cm in diameter; straight and cylindrical bole; crown with large erect branches, crown curved, dense evergreen foliage; bark gray to pale brown, rough in old trees, fairly thick slice up to 1 cm thick, yellowish, granular, very hard.
Leaves alternate, paripinnately compound, 3-5 pairs of leaflets alternate or opposite; leaflets elliptical or obovate, up to 15 x 7.5 cm, rounded to broadly obtuse. Male unisexual plants or hermaphrodites.
Inflorescences in simple axillary clusters up to 20 cm long.
Flowers greenish-yellow, downy, fragrant; pentamers.
Fruits: fleshy capsules, pyriform, up to 7 cm x 3.5 cm, orange red, pendulous, opening in 3 hairy valves inside; yellow aril enveloping the seed up to half height.
Seeds: 1-3 per fruit, black.
Leaves persistent in the dry season. Flowering from October to March. Fruiting from March to September.
Variability and conservation of the resource
Blighia sapida is grown in nurseries in urban and peri-urban areas. The plants are used as ornamental tree avenues.
Agronomy
It is a species that only bears male flowers or bisexual flowers. Flowering often occurs twice a year, in the second part of the dry season and at the end of the rainy season. The fruit is a fleshy capsule containing black seeds. Germination is quite fast (2-4 weeks), with a high rate. It is a full-light essence with fairly rapid growth. In Yaoundé, from seedlings, the first flowering took place at 5 years and the first fruiting at 7 years (Vivien and Faure, 1995).
uses
In the Sahelian zones of West Africa (Ivory Coast and Ghana in particular), Blighia sapida is planted in agglomerations for its shade.
The parts of the plant used are: fruit, bark, leaves, seeds and wood.
Since the immature aril of the seed is poisonous, only the mature aril of the fruit is edible raw, cooked or fried. The fruit of Blighia sapida is rich in oil. This scented oil is used in Jamaica where the species has been planted since its introduction by African slaves (Vivien and Faure, 1995). In West Africa, this vegetable fat is an excellent condiment for sauces.
In African traditional medicine, vegetable fat extracted from Blighia sapida seeds has medicinal value (N'Klo, 2001). The outer skin of the fruit is used to treat paronychia (Arbonnier, 2000). The bark and leaves are widely used for medicinal purposes in the dry areas of West Africa. The bark is stimulating and toned. The leaves are used to treat diseases such as angina, conjunctivitis, wounds, jaundice and intestinal worms (Arbonnier, 2000).
The fruit of Blighia sapida is a peach poison. Green fruits and seeds are used in West Africa as a substitute for soap and the seeds produce tattoo ink (Arbonnier, 2000). Wood, very resistant to termites is used as a building material. This wood is an excellent fuel that gives a coal of very good quality.