Kakadu Plum Skincare

Pellelucent is excited to include Kakadu Plum as one of the active ingredients in our anti-ageing skin care products.

Kakadu Plum is a Native Australian Organic Botanical

Kakadu Plum is a native tree from Australia, found exclusively in the Northern Territory and Arnhem Land. Indigenous Australians have used this plant and fruit extensively for food, its healing properties and in traditional medicine with particular application for a variety of skin-disorders and for the treatment of burns, rashes and infections.

The Properties of Kakadu Plum

Kakadu Plum has amazing properties in regards to skin care. It is one of the richest sources of Vitamin C in the world (studies show the concentration of vitamin C in Kakadu Plum to be as high as 3200-5000mg/100g, compared to 50mg/100g for oranges) it is a powerful antioxidant protecting the skin against environmental ageing. Since Vitamin C stimulates an amino acid that’s required to make collagen, Kakadu Plum is a wonderful addition to a skin cream as it can help plump and restore skin cells resulting in amazing anti-ageing effects.

Vitamin C Brightens the Complexion

Vitamin C is also a skin brightener used to correct dark circles, pigmentation, age spots and provide a general radiance boost. All of these aspects are important for consumers to keep in mind when they are searching for the best anti ageing cream, and who may be considering the use of Kakadu Plum skincare.

The Kakadu Plum has the world’s highest source of vitamin C

The Importance of Super-Star Anti-Oxidant Vitamin C

Vitamin C is a powerful antioxidant and an essential nutrient to help slow the aging process. Vitamin C is essential for the formation of proline, an amino acid that is required to make collagen. Due to its massive vitamin C content, Kakadu Plum skin care is becoming increasingly popular.

The vitamin C in Kakadu Plum is a natural antioxidant. As you may already know, antioxidants scavenge free radicals, unstable atoms and molecules that promote pre-mature aging which is important to look for in products that may claim to be the best anti ageing cream.

Medicinal Properties of Kakadu Plum

Kakadu plum’s medicinal properties are exceptional. It contains phytochemicals such as gallic and ellagic acids. Gallic acid has antibacterial, antiviral and antifungal activities and also shows anti-inflammatory activities. These properties have substantial benefits in terms of skin care.

Vitamin C is Not the Only Anti-oxidant in Kakadu Plum

Vitamin C aside, Kakadu plums are also rich in phenolics, phytochemicals that have been shown to possess extremely strong antioxidant properties. In fact, research suggests that the phenolic content of a fruit or vegetable may be the single best indicator of the food’s antioxidant capacity (even better than the food’s vitamin C content).

Considering the high levels of antioxidant nutrients and phytochemicals found in Kakadu Plum, it is not surprising that this Australian superfood has been shown to beat many other fruits in terms of antioxidant capacity. This is a significant reason as to why Kakadu Plum is present in Pellelucent skin cream.

Summary of Kakadu Plum Benefits

There are four main reasons why Kakadu Plum skin care is so popular and why Kakadu Plum is such an important active in Pellelucent anti-ageing skin care products:

ANTIOXIDANT – ASCORBIC ACID: VITAMIN C

• Reduces wrinkles and improves skin texture.
• Protects skin cells & skin’s support structure from UV-related damage.
• An antioxidant that helps reduce skin damage caused by free radicals.
• Improves the appearance of sun-damaged skin.
• Strengthens skin’s barrier response.
• Reduces inflammation.
• Dramatically increases the synthesis of collagen.
• Lessens hyper-pigmentation (skin whitening possibilities)
• Boost efficacy of sunscreen additives.

PHENOLIC ACIDS

• Antimicrobial, antioxidant, & anti-inflammatory properties.
• Antioxidant activity considered stronger than that of Vitamin E.
• Anti-inflammatory action reduces the appearance of fine lines & wrinkles.
• Behaves like an alpha-hydroxy acid (AHA).

PHENOLIC ANTIOXIDANT: GALLIC ACID

• Gallic acid is known for its anti-inflammatory, anti-fungal & anti-viral properties.
• Gallic acid acts as an antioxidant to protect skin cells from free radicals.
• Excellent wound healer and may have a use in the treatment of psorasis.

PHENOLIC ANTIOXIDANT: ELLAGIC ACID

• Ellagic acid encourages elasticity & suppleness in aged skin.
• Reduces inflammation of skin cells.

Benefits to Australia’s Indigenous Communities

Growing interest in Kakadu Plum as both a food supplement and in skin care products has seen a remarkable opportunity for Australia’s indigenous communities to create new industries.

In an article for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, journalist Peta Doherty reported:

One of Australia’s first commercial crops of plantation-grown Kakadu plums is about to be harvested by an Indigenous community south of Broome in Western Australia.

The ABC understands there has been just one other commercial Kakadu plum harvest from a plantation in Australia.

Hundreds of tonnes of the bush tucker, also known as Gubinge, are needed to meet skyrocketing global demand for the super food and industry experts believe commercial plantations are the only way to do it.

“The growing global market is potentially enormous,” Kim Courtenay, a horticulture trainer who helped the Bidyadanga community establish its plantation 10 years ago said.

“We’ve heard that places like China want hundreds of tonnes and at the moment the amount harvested from the whole north of Australia is only in the tens of tonnes.”

He said in his 20 years working with Indigenous groups, he had never seen a better opportunity for communities.

 In a report for the ABC’s PM show, journalist Lucy Martin reported:

Bush tucker researchers say the gubinge industry is about to take off, with the fruit tipped to be one of the next big ‘superfoods’ to gain international attention.

Until now the remote location and unreliable supply of the fruit, also known as the Kakadu plum, has hampered efforts to supply it.

But now the fruit’s possible use in cosmetics and medicinal products is attracting fresh attention, with strong interest at a recent Californian food expo, and rumours Chinese interests want to buy 800 tonnes.

Kim Courtenay from the Kimberley Institute said it was inevitable that the fruit, which has been labelled a superfood due its to its high vitamin C content, would take off.

“There’s no doubt it is going to be an industry,” he said.

“I guess our priority is making sure it’s an industry that does give local people the most benefits.”

“After the expo, apparently there were Chinese interests who wanted 800 tonnes. And they said, ‘Well, look, at the moment there’s only about 20 tonnes collected across the entire north of Australia’.” 

Kimberley woman Pat Torres, who runs a cooperative that involves local families supplying fruit to health shops and restaurants, said her family had been picking the fruit in the bush around Broome for as long as she could remember.

“If you eat it as a fresh fruit, it has a sweet and a sour sort of taste, and if you cook it, it’s like eating pears and apples cooked up. So it’s hard to really describe what it’s like. You need to taste it, basically,” she said.

“Our families, when we’re collecting it and we’re eating it, can pick for hours because it gives you an incredible burst of energy.

“The fruit has been eaten by locals in the region for 40,000 years.

“The demand by industry far outstrips what we can offer in terms of collecting it from the wild. So we’ve had people from overseas come and check out our trees. And they say they want 50 tonnes in order to do their cosmetics or their medicine.”

Mr Courtenay believes the demand will be met by planting new trees in existing gubinge patches across northern Australia, but thinks the challenge will be transporting it across vast distances.

Anne Shanley from the Kindred Spirits Foundation, which previously helped the Northern Territory community of Wadeye to develop its gubinge industry, is developing the answer to that challenge.

“We need to have fruit coming from Aboriginal communities which have a permit to pick the fruit and it needs to be quality assured. So we need to have proper freezers and proper transport, and be able to track that everything is going well,” she said.

The Kindred Spirits Foundation wants to build gubinge hubs in larger communities across northern Australia, and a central processing plant in Darwin.

It will also create a national co-op for growers, and Ms Shanley says the next step is securing funding from government and the private sector.

In Broome, Ms Torres says Gubinge is an incredible opportunity for Aboriginal people.

But she is anxious to keep the control in Aboriginal hands.

“So much has been taken from Indigenous people, and this is one of the few things left where we can do business with it,” she said.

“We understand the tree, we understand the seasons, we know how to protect it, we know how to collect the fruit.

“This industry can provide us with honest, hard work that we can connect to.”