Journal of Applied Phycology 12: 493–498, 2000.

© 2000 Kluwer Academic Publishers. Printed in the Netherlands.

493

Harvest of Arthrospira platensis from Lake Kossorom (Chad) and its

household usage among the Kanembu

Gatugel Abdulqader1 , Laura Barsanti2 & Mario R. Tredici1∗

1 Dipartimento di Biotecnologie Agrarie, Universita’ degli Studi di Firenze, P.le delle Cascine, 27, 50144 –
Firenze, Italy
2 Istituto di Biofisica – CNR, Area della Ricerca di S. Cataldo, Via Alfieri, 1, 56010 – Pisa, Italy

(∗ Author for correspondence; e-mail mario.tredici@unifi.it)

Received 25 March 2000; revised 6 May 2000; accepted 6 May 2000

Key words: Arthrospira, Chad, dihé, Kanembu, Lake Kossorom, Spirulina

Abstract
In 1997 a survey was conducted among the Kanembu who harvest Arthrospira (Spirulina) from Lake Kossorom in
the Prefecture of Lac (Chad). Information on the amount of Arthrospira harvested and the preparation and use of
dihé was obtained by interviewing the women who daily gather around the lake for the harvesting.Dihé is obtained
by filtering and sun drying the algal biomass on the sandy shores of the lake. The semi-dried dihé is then cut into
small squares and taken to the villages, where the drying is completed on mats in the sun. Dihé is mainly used to
prepare la souce, a kind of fish or meat and vegetable broth. Part of the harvest is sold to local consumers or to
wholesalers, who trade the product in the markets of Massakori, Massaquet and N’Djamena and also across the
border of the country. The local trading value of the dihé annually harvested from Lake Kossorom (about 40 t)
amounts to more than US $100,000, which represents an important contribution to the economy of the area.

Arthrospira (formerly Spirulina, Tomaselli et al.,
1996) has a history of human consumption in Mex-
ico and in Africa (Ciferri, 1983). About 1300 AD
the Aztecs harvested Arthrospira from Lake Texcoco
and used it to make a sort of dry cake called tecuit-
latl (Farrar, 1966). Very likely the use of Arthrospira
as food in Chad dates back to the same period, or
even earlier, to the Kanem Empire (ninth century AD)
(Bjørkelo, 1976). Thus, two populations discovered
indepently the food properties of Arthrospira in spite
of the differences and the distance.
Human consumption of Arthrospira in Chad was
reported for the first time in 1940 by Dangeard in the
little known Journal of the Linnean Society of Bor-
deaux, but at that time it failed to capture the attention
it deserved because of the war. In 1966 the botanist Le-
onard, member of the 1964–65 Belgian Trans-Saharan
Expedition, reported finding a greenish, edible sub-
stance being sold as dry cakes in the market of Fort-
Lamy (today N’Djamena, the capital of Chad). His
investigation revealed that these greenish cakes, called
dihé, were a common component of the diet of the
Kanembu populations of Chad and Niger, and that
they were almost entirely composed of Arthrospira, a
blue-green alga blooming naturally in the saline-soda
lakes of the region (Leonard, 1966; Leonard & Com-
père, 1967; Compère, 1967). In 1976, Delpeuch and
his collaborators of ORSTOM (Office de la Recherche
Scientifique et Technique Outre-mer, Paris, France)
carried out a study on the nutritional and economic im-
portance of dihé for the populations of the Prefectures
of Kanem and Lac in Chad (Delpeuch et al., 1976).
The consumption of Spirulina by the Kanembu was
mentioned also by Delisle et al. (1991) in a survey of
household food consumption and nutritional adequacy
in wadi zones of Chad.
In January 1997, one of us (GA) visited Lake
Kossorom and the nearby village of Tafah in the Pre-
fecture of Lac, where Arthrospira is still harvested
and consumed by the Kanembu. Information on the
494
Figure 1. Lake Chad, showing the serrated profile of its north
and east shores, broken up into innumerable small bays and inlets
between the old sand dunes. The arrow indicates the location of
Lake Kossorom (drawing based on Beadle, 1974, and on a U. S.
Geological Survey satellite image taken in January 1997).
preparation and household usage of dihé, and data
on the amount of Arthrospira biomass harvested from
the lake were obtained by interviewing the women
who daily gathered around the lake for the harvesting.
Here we describe the harvesting of the alga and the
preparation and cooking of dihé, and report on the
socio-economic importance this unique ‘blue-green
food’ has among the Kanembu who live around Lake
Kossorom.
Lake Kossorom is a soda lake at the irregular north-
east fringe of Lake Chad (Figure 1), in the Prefecture
of Lac, 600 m N-E of the village of Tafah. It fills a
natural depression at the foot of a dune headland, and
extends for about 1000 m, with a width of 30–100 m
and a mean depth of 1.5 m (Figures 2a, 2b). It is con-
stantly fed by the aquifer of Lake Chad, but, despite its
nearness to this lake, in the past 25 years it has never
been flooded.
Arthrospira is harvested from Lake Kossorom
throughout the year, with a minimum yield in Decem-
ber and January, and a maximum in the period between
June and September during the rainy season. Only
Kanembu women carry out the harvesting; men are
banned from entering the water, since it is a deep-
rooted belief that they would make the lake barren.
Women come from different villages (Kaldikorotì, Ar-
toshin, Salari), some from as far away as a 2-hour
walk from the lake. The harvesting begins early in
the morning, and the work is coordinated by an old
woman (the captain) who is responsible for guarding
the lake even when the harvesting is over. Up to 200
women, ranging in age from 4 to 80 years, may be
present around the shore every day. Just before har-
vesting begins, the women form a line along the shore
(Figure 2c) at positions assigned to them by the cap-
tain according to the village they come from, so as to
avoid overcrowding in areas where the alga bloom is
more abundant and where trampling and muddying of
the water would reduce the quality of dihé. The har-
vesting begins as soon as the captain enters the lake
(Figure 2d), according to rules and procedures handed
down from mother to daughter from time immemorial.
With their basins, the women skim off the blue-green
mat that floats at the surface of the water, especially
along the shore (Figure 2e), and pour it into twine
baskets, which act as primary filters, or directly into
jars (Figure 2f). In about two hours the harvesting is
over, and the women move to sandy areas close to the
lake for the filtration and drying of the alga (Figure 3).
The women dig in the sand round holes, 40–50 cm
in diameter and about 5 cm deep (Figure 3a), and
line them with clean sand, which is patted to obtain
a smooth, firm surface. The algal suspension is then
carefully poured into the holes (Figures 3b, 3c), and
the surface of the biomass is smoothed with the palm
of the hand (Figure 3d). Within a few minutes, almost
all of the extracellular water will have seeped out of
the biomass, and the dihé is then cut into 8–10 cm
squares, 1–1.5 cm thick (Figures 3e, 3f). Since most of
the women who harvest the alga from Lake Kossorom
come from distant villages, they remove the dihé from
the holes as soon as it is firm enough for the squares
to be handled without breaking and take it away. Once
back at their villages, the drying is completed on mats
in the sun.
Dihé is mainly used to prepare la souce, a kind of
fish or meat and vegetable broth, served with staple
cereals. Well-dried dihé is crumbled in a bowl either
by hand or with a mortar and pestle; cold water is
then added to disperse the lumps, and the suspen-
sion is strained through a fine sieve to remove such
solid impurities as sticks, grass and leaves (Figure 4a).
The suspension is poured away from most of the sand
that settles to the bottom of the bowl. The cleaned
dihé is cooked for 1–1.5 h, which further disperse the
lumps, yielding a blue-green broth that still contains
small amounts of plant debris and sand. This broth
 495

Figure 2. a, b: Lake Kossorom with occasional acacia trees standing out around the shore, and dense thickets of reeds, papyrus, and cattail
floating into the water; c-f: harvesting of the algal bloom from Lake Kossorom.

is transferred into a bowl, and left to settle for 5–10
minutes to allow sedimentation of any residual sand
(Figure 4b). In the meantime onions are sautéed in
seed oil until golden, and the broth is then strained
very carefully once more onto the onions, to prevent
any residual sand from passing into the casserole. Salt,
chili peppers, bouillon cubes, and gombo (Hibiscus
esculentus) are added (Figures 4c, 4d), and la souce is
then simmered and occasionally stirred until cooked.
La souce can be served with corn, millet, or sorghum
meal.
Kanembu women store the dried dihé until there is
enough to warrant a trip to the closest market, keep-
ing a small amount for the necessities of the family.
They go to the market once every two or three weeks,
and sell dihé directly to local consumers or to whole-
salers at a price that ranges between 1500 and 2000
CFA francs (about US $ 2.4–3.2) per korò (equiva-
lent to about 1–1.5 kg). Wholesalers trade dihé in the
496
Figure 3. Drying of the alga and preparation of dihé on the shore of Lake Kossorom.
markets of Massakori, Massaquet, and N’Djamena at
very much higher prices. From these markets, dihé can
also be taken across the borders of Chad to Nigeria,
Cameroon and other countries.
The money Kanembu women make by selling dihé
permits them a certain degree of independence, since
it is theirs to use for personal needs such as clothes,
cosmetics and jewellery, but it can also be used to
provide staples for the family when the head of the
household is unable to supply these. Many women set
aside some of the money to buy goats, which then
represent their own capital, to be sold when financial
difficulties arise or kept to provide the family with
milk and butter, which in turn may be further import-
ant sources of income. Therefore, dihé turns out to be a
source of money not only for the women, but also for
the whole family. In families where men are absent,
or are too old to till the land or go fishing or herd-
ing, dihé may represent the only means of subsistence.
However, since Kanembu men tend to play down the

Figure 4. Cooking of dihé to prepare la souce.
economic importance of women’s labour, the income
from dihé is rarely considered among the entries of
the family budget. The harvesting of dihé benefits also
the chef du village of Tafah, since each woman who
harvests from Lake Kossorom has to pay him 500 CFA
francs every two weeks. Considering that an average
of 200 women make the same payment, we can estim-
ate that the chef du village receives about 200,000 CFA
francs (about US $320) a month. In turn, the chef du
village gives some of this money to the marabout (the
religious leader) and to the chef du canton.
From the data collected at Lake Kossorom, we cal-
culated an average harvest of 0.5–0.8 korò of dihé per
woman per day. Considering an average daily presence
of 200 women, we can estimate that about 40 t of dihé
are harvested from this lake every year. Its local trad-
ing value amounts to more than US $100,000, which
represents an important contribution to the economy
of the area.
497
Acknowledgements
We are deeply grateful to Prof. Ralph A. Lewin for his
help and encouragement.
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