Dubai: You may have heard about Camelicious milk chocolates or soap products rolled out by a Dubai company and sold at a premium in the Gulf, Europe and Japan.
The company isn't stopping there. Now, for the first time ever, made-in-Dubai camel milk personal care products are coming out on the world stage, showcased at a three-day international beauty fair, which opened here on Tuesday.
UAE camel milk brand produced by Emirates Industry for Camel Milk & Products (EICMP) has taken the world stage by introducing its new beauty and personal care line "Camellure".
Camelicious Beauty, a brand under EICMP, has unveiled four shampoo variants at the on-going Beauty World 2015 trade show.
At Dh30 ($8) to Dh40 ($10.31) for a 200ml bottle, the Camellure shampoo price is a bit on the high side, compared to more established brands.
"This product will target the high-end segment of the market only," she said.
Besides the UAE, the four initial camel milk shampoo variants will hit other Gulf markets. "We have an eye, of course, on the US, Europe and Malaysia, because we see a lot of potential for camel milk and camel milk products there," said Kirsten Lange, director of communications at EICMP.
So what's prompted the camel milk firm's foray into beauty products and who's behind it?
"We have a product developer who is working closely with our laboratory on the farm site," she said, adding that the company is working on a much wider variety of beauty products based on camel milk and also due out soon.
Inside a sprawling farm off the Dubai-Al Ain Road, the company now produces 6,000 litres of camel milk per day (up from 5,000 litres daily in 2013), and has started supplying fresh milk to the UK. It also supplies camel milk powder to premium chocolate-maker Al Nassma Chocolates LLC.
Production
Bedouins have used camel milk as mother's milk substitute and as a sort of sun screen.
Commercial quantities of milk from dromedaries, though, are not available until recently. Since 2006, the Dubai-based camel milk producer has marketed its products and became the world's first and only camel farm engaged in large-scale milk production.
The Camellure stand at Beauty World 2015 also displays camel soap and the cosmetic line Skinue, a camel-milk based product line produced by Jordanian biotech company Monojo.
Beauty World 2015 is the largest international trade fair for beauty products, hair, fragrances and wellbeing in the Middle East, being held from May 26 to 28, 2015 at Dubai World Trade Centre. The show is organised by the Messe Frankfurt group.
Camel milk treatment for autism?
Camel's milk, packed with numerous proteins and used by Bedoiuns as supplement for mother's milk for centuries, is proven to be nutritious.
But there's been scant research on its benefits, though a 2014 "double-blind" study published in the peer-reviewed journal Nature has revealed startling results.
The study shows camel milk administered for two weeks significantly improved clinical measurements of autism severity and decreased serum level of thymus and activation-regulated chemokine (TARC) and childhood autism rating scale (CARS) in autistic children.
The study was conducted on 45 subjects diagnosed with autism who were randomly assigned to receive boiled camel milk, raw camel milk and placebo (cow milk).
Not only did the researchers find significant drops in serum levels of TARC in the boiled and raw camel milk group, but also marked improvements were seen in CARS score in raw camel milk group. No effect was observed in the placebo group. The researchers, however, recommended further studies.
