Health benefits of Noni plant (1)

BY OLUFUNKE

Sometimes this year, BBC Yoruba interviewed a family who were hospitalised and even lost one because they ate cassava peels. During the interview, the woman said they had nothing to eat and she went to pick cassava peels, dried it and made it into powder to be eaten as “Amala”.That story broke my heart and I said to myself that I wish she had made the peels go through fermentation. Raw cassava contains cyanide, which is toxic to ingest. This is why it is made to go through fermentation to make it safe for consumption. Things are really hard now. People are hungry. Let us keep hope alive, this difficult phase will pass.

In 2021, I started a series called medicinal plants in Nigeria. It was a lengthy series. Now that we discussed Stevia and Monk fruit, I have the urge to be discussing medicinal plants once in a while again. This time, we will be discussing exotic plants that are highly medicinal and you can get their seedlings to buy here in Nigeria so you can plant in your homes.

Have you taken noni juice before? It is a very popular drink. This is the plant our discussion is about this week. Morinda citrifolia is a fruit-bearing tree in the coffee family, Rubiaceae. It is the plant that bears noni fruit. It is found in the Pacific Islands, Southeast Asia, Australia and India. Indigenous peoples used the fruit as emergency food during famines. Therefore, it is also called “starvation fruit”. It has resilience against fire, flood and draught. The tree can be burnt to the ground and it will grow back and fruit prolifically all year round.

Southeast Asians and Aboriginal Australians consume the fresh fruit with salt or cook it with curry. The seeds are edible when roasted. In Thai cuisine, the leaves known as bai-yo are used as a leaf vegetable and are the main ingredient of Kaeng bai-yo, cooked with coconut milk. The fruit luk-yo is added as a salad ingredient to some versions of green papaya salad. In Cambodia, the leaves are an essential part of the national dish fish amok.

In traditional pharmacopoeia, the fruit is claimed to prevent and cure several diseases. It is primarily used to stimulate the immune system and thus to fight bacterial, viral, parasitic and fungal infections.

Polynesian healers have used noni fruits for thousands of years to help treat a variety of health problems such as diabetes, high blood pressure, aches, pains, burns, arthritis, inflammation, tumours, the effects of aging, parasitic, viral and bacterial infections. All the plant parts are used for a variety of illnesses in Samoan culture and noni is one of the most frequently used Hawaiian plant medicines.

I spoke with Mr Damilare Adewuyi, the CEO of DAMADES GLOBAL RESOURCES. He is a noni plant grower here in Nigeria. He told me that noni has wound- healing activity. He said a man usually purchase noni leaves from him because he was instructed at the hospital to get it to speed up the healing of his fracture. He told me that the plant is good for arthritis, libido, blood sugar lowering and it does more.

Noni attracted attention as a dietary supplement. A variety of beverages (juice drinks), powders (from dried ripe or unripe fruits), cosmetic products (lotions, soaps), oil (from seeds), and leaf powders (for encapsulation or pills) have been introduced into the consumer market. Perhaps most popular is its juice; according to a research review published in the journal Foods in April 2018, over 108 million gallons of just one brand of the juice were consumed in more than 80 countries during the first 12 years it was available commercially.

Like many of the best things in life, it comes with a little stank, noni in general, has a pungent and astringent flavour. This has earned the fruit names like “cheese fruit” and “vomit fruit”. Some benefits of garlic like prevention of certain cancers, lowering of blood sugar, cholesterol and blood pressure are credited to the presence of the sulphur-containing compound, Allicin which is the major contributor to the odour of freshly crushed garlic. Garlic without allicin is like a Samson with his hair shaved! Try to love all your plants with whatever flaw they come with because most of the time, that is where their healing properties lie.