Entities
ORPIA Group markets solutions developed by ORPIA Innovation
Our history
Orpia Group was born from a simple observation; Ivory Coast is the world's leading producer of cashew nuts, accounting for >55% of the global production, and yet, more than 90% of these nuts are sent to Asia for processing. The shelled cashew nuts are then sent to Europe and North America for consumption... Balance sheet? The cashew nuts we eat have one in two chances of having travelled around the world before ending up on our plates.
After shelling, the emptied hulls are mostly burned, without any valorization. Seeing this desolate observation as a potential for innovation, Samuel Mamane (founder) teamed up with researchers from the CNRS (ICGM, Montpellier) to find a way to change the model and bring value to a biomass that is currently neglected. This is how ORPIA Innovation’s adventure began in 2018.
“There is no such thing as chance,
things happen for a reason”
Several ways of recovering cashew hulls have been identified through this fruitful collaboration, offering innovative and effective solutions for many applications.
Within this seemingly innocuous biomass hides an oil, called Cashew Nut Shell Liquid (CNSL), unique in the plant kingdom due to its chemical structure (>95% natural, fatty phenolic compounds) and its availability (300,000 tons / year in Ivory Coast alone). It thus asserts itself as a natural choice for the green chemistry industry.
Building on these years of development within the R&D branch of ORPIA Innovation, ORPIA Group was founded in 2023 to commercialize CNSL-derived solutions in various markets: detergents, cosmetics, materials, animal feed, energy, environment, etc.
Witnessing the legitimate desire of African countries to develop more local cashew nut processing facilities, ORPIA Group has decided to support this virtuous dynamic via its subsidiary ORPIA Afrique, by offering West African manufacturers innovative technological solutions to fully recycle and valorize all their by-products. As both almonds and hulls are now recycled, the cashew sector benefits from an optimal value chain that facilitates investment in local industrial units. Thanks to the establishment of local partnerships with raw nut producers and processors, ORPIA Afrique has a true network of suppliers, industrial and engineering partners, ensuring optimal availability and quality of its raw material.
