In 1976, at the initiative of Pedro L. Qüerio, Guillermo Triest and Raúl Fasciolo, jojoba cultivation was first undertaken in Argentina. This first planting of seeds from the University of Arizona was carried out in Las Oscuras, Córdoba, within the Arid Chaco area’s ecosystem. Some of these original specimens have managed to survive cattle to our present date. Twenty-eight years later, jojoba crops in the arid areas of the Greater Chaco and the Monte desert have positioned Argentina as the world’s leading jojoba oil and seed producer and exporter.
Even though virtually all jojoba is currently used by the cosmetics industry for manufacturing top-quality products, jojoba pioneers had envisioned the plant’s liquid wax as a basic element for the pharmaceutical industry first, followed by the energy sector. The first pharmaceutical study to provide an early indication of the potential underlying jojoba wax can be traced back to Argentina in 1949. The research work performed by medical doctors José W. Tobias, Aimar F. Mazzuco, and Raúl J. Latorre at the Instituto Modelo de Medicina Luis Agote medical institute in Buenos Aires, based on the application of wax from seeds collected in the U.S., provided a way to control the TB bacillus.
Later on, through state-owned Yacimientos Petrolíferos Fiscales (YPF), Argentina identified the advantages of introducing jojoba into the formulation of oils subjected to extremely demanding conditions. For that purpose, the company used wax from seeds obtained from the University of Arizona 1978 and, later on, from the first seeds harvested in Córdoba in 1985. At present, when the entire world has its eyes turned to “clean”, renewable alternatives to the limited and highly polluting fossil energy resources, jojoba has become center stage for the oil industry once again.
This section has been designed to provide to readers interested in learning about jojoba development in Argentina published papers and research work, allowing a better understanding of the path that producers, technicians and scientists have gone down, step by step, to turn Argentina into the world’s main supplier of jojoba liquid wax.
Reference material has been grouped into papers, books and government orders, rules and regulations, organized by year of publication. We have included some purchase/reading alternatives depending on the availability of the material:
- Summary or full text: a summary or the full text is available on the Internet
- Bookstores: the material can be purchased online (more than one alternative may be provided).
- Libraries: libraries where the material is available.
Works currently unavailable at bookstores or libraries will be progressively digitalized and added as the appropriate use authorizations are granted.
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