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Service.com slash podcasts. Right across the northern part of my country Ghana, the most common trees you can find are the shear trees, millions of them, some more than a century old.

This is a program about the lives of the women who turned the nut of the shear tree into butter,

what I call shear gold. ago.

My name is Rebecca Atonyengue.

I am a widow.

My husband died and left me with four children, one boy and three girls.

My name is Aquessie Sappong. I've always wondered where the sheer batter used to make high-end body

lotions and sweets sold on high streets from London to Paris and New York to Beijing comes from.

Who are the women who make them and what their life like?

So I've come to Anatim, a town in Northern Ghana to find out.

This work is just for women and not men so men don't do it. If your wife is doing it then you may decide to help but men don't do it.

Who taught you how to make shea? When we were children, our mothers used to go to the bush, pick the nuts, and then pound

and grind them before frying them.

They would then fetch water and start the extraction

process. Then we will cook with the butter and also use it as pomid and be happy. That's

how we learnt it. They used to produce quality butter which looks very neat and of

great quality. So we were taught to do the same. We used to do the grinding and be

singing along. My brothers and sisters, my heart is broken in this world. I weave baskets, carry

firewood and produce shebatter.

We feed from it.

...