JOJOBA SEED OIL
- Jojoba is a perennial, evergreen, dioecious, wind-pollinated shrub, reaching a height of 1-5 meters and having a long life span (100-200 years). It is endemic to the Sonoran desert (south west Arizona and California, Northern Mexico and Baja California).
- Jojoba is grown for the liquid wax (commonly called jojoba oil) in its seeds. This oil is rare in that it is an extremely long (C36-C46) straight-chain wax ester and not a triglyceride, making jojoba and its derivative jojoba esters more similar to human sebum and whale oil than to traditional vegetable oils.
- Because sperm whales are endangered, plantations of Jojoba have been established in a number of desert and semi-desert areas, predominantly in Argentina, Israel, Mexico, Palestinian Authority, Peru and the United States. It is currently the Sonoran Desert’s second most economically valuable native plant