Scientific discovery of medicinal properties The trade started when
Russell Marker, a chemist looking for a plant source from which to extract
diosgenin and
saponin, traveled to
Veracruz looking for the yam
Dioscorea mexicana which he suspected might be suitable. He hired two Mexican campesinos to bring him exemplars of the
tuber. When he discovered that the root was indeed a significant source of diosgenin, he established Syntex, the first Mexican fine chemical company dedicated to producing
semisynthetic hormones from Barbasco. Before this development, natural hormones were extracted from animal sources, such as urine from pregnant mares or women, or from bull testes; prices were consequently very high. With the development of the process of
Marker degradation which allowed the production of hormones from vegetable
saponin sources, Marker began a search for a plant
steroid of the sapogenin class with a ring structure more like
progesterone. With the discovery of the chemical properties of the barbasco root, world market prices for steroids and other synthetic hormones plummeted, making them feasible for large-scale production of medicines for common ailments such as
arthritis or
Addison's disease, and eventually as the basis for the
combined oral contraceptive pill.
The development of the industry This development sparked a barbasco extraction industry centered on the barbasco-rich areas of southeastern Mexico, in Northern
Oaxaca, Southern
Veracruz and
Puebla states. Especially the area called
Chinantla in Northern Oaxaca, around the cities of
Tuxtepec and
Valle Nacional. The root was extracted in the wild by
barbasqueros, often poor
Indigenous Chinantecs, who ventured into the jungle to dig out the tuber with digging sticks or with their bare hands. Before becoming used industrially, the tuber was used by
Chinantec healers in northern
Oaxaca as an
abortifacient and in cures for aching joints. It was also used by Chinantecs as a poison for fishing in the
Papaloapan river. By the mid-1970s, 125,000 Mexican peasants depended on the barbasco trade for their livelihood, and ten tons of barbasco per week were extracted from the wild. Quickly, a system of middlemen appeared, as those who had enough means to pay
barbasqueros, started buying large quantities, often using a system of
debt peonage. They would start by giving the
barbasquero a loan, which he or she would then have to pay off with barbasco. These middlemen would eventually establish
acopios, recollection and distribution centers where large quantities of barbasco are gathered and shipped on to the
beneficios, the processing plants. The acopio owners knew more about the process and eventually invented ways of improving the diosgenin concentration in roots collected by adding different solvents to the tubers before shipping them to the beneficios.
End of the barbasco era In the late 1970s, populist President
Luis Echeverría sought to organize and nationalize the barbasco trade in order to provide more benefits to the barbasqueros and to the Mexican state. He established the organization PROQUIVEMEX (Productos Químicos Vegetales de México). However, at this point, Mexico had lost its status as a world leader in the synthetic hormone market, and the barbasco trade was declining, just as the root was becoming depleted in the wild. ==References==