Shea Butter Grades

What shea butter grades are

A shea butter grade is a quality class for unrefined butter, assigned from a short list of measurable and sensory properties — not from colour alone, not from the word "organic", and not from whether the butter was refined. Collectors, traders and buyers needed a shared language for freshness before a full laboratory certificate exists. The grade is that language: it tells you, in one letter, whether the kernels were handled well enough for cosmetics, whether the lot is better sent to a refinery, or whether it should not be offered as a cosmetic fat at all.

What a grade is not matters as much as what it is. It is not a botanical variety. West African Vitellaria paradoxa and East African nilotica are subspecies, not grades. It is not a country of origin. Nigerian, Ghanaian and Burkinabè butter can all be Grade A or Grade C depending on post-harvest handling. It is not a certification: organic, fair-trade and COSMOS marks sit on a different axis. It is not a process name. Cold-pressed describes extraction; N-RBD describes refining. Neither letter-grades the butter.

West African trade also uses Grade 1, Grade 2 and Grade 3. Those numerals map, in ordinary speech, to Grade A, Grade B and Grade C — Grade 1 ≈ A, Grade 2 ≈ B, Grade 3 ≈ C — when the cited regional ECOWAS/UEMOA bands are the reference. This page uses A/B/C in the headings because that is how most export buyers write a purchase order, and it prints the published Grade 1/2/3 numbers in the table so the mapping is explicit. A short definition is on the Grade A shea butter glossary page.

Why grades exist is practical. A cooperative receiving wet nuts in the rainy season, a trader buying kernels by the sack, and a cosmetic buyer opening a drum in Rotterdam are looking at the same fat at different moments. They cannot all wait for a full nine-parameter certificate before they speak. Free fatty acid, moisture and a look and sniff at the butter give them a shared, if imperfect, ranking. The ranking is honest only when everyone agrees which threshold set they are using — a national standard, a regional band, or the numbers written on the purchase order.

Shea butter grades classify unrefined butter by quality; they do not classify refined butter and they do not describe how the kernels were pressed. If you need the wider production story, return to the complete guide to shea butter.

Grade A vs Grade B vs Grade C

The three unrefined classes differ on six properties set out as a grid: free fatty acid, moisture and volatiles, peroxide value, colour, odour and texture. The first three are laboratory numbers. The last three are sensory. A lot is only as good as its weakest cell. A butter that meets a Grade A free-fatty-acid band but smells fermented is not Grade A. A butter that looks ivory and smells clean but carries high moisture is not Grade A either.

The numbers in the table below are published ECOWAS/UEMOA regional grade bands (Grade 1 / 2 / 3). In trade speech those bands are Grade A, B and C. They are not EMI Agro SOP limits and they are not the contractual figures on a given purchase order. EMI Agro supplies unrefined Grade A shea butter and refined N-RBD shea butter. Grade B and Grade C are discussed here as market grades a buyer will meet in the trade, not as EMI Agro catalogue SKUs.

The weakest-parameter rule is the one buyers forget. A lot is the grade of its worst property. Paste the three laboratory numbers into the shea butter grade checker to see which published band the weakest cell falls into. Colour cannot rescue a high free-fatty-acid result, and a pale colour cannot make a wet lot Grade A.

Grade A unrefined shea butter is the lot whose weakest parameter still meets the Grade A limits; one high FFA result makes the lot Grade B or C regardless of colour. That is why a Certificate of Analysis has to travel with the shipment, and why a photograph of yellow butter is not a grade.

Typical uses follow the chemistry. Grade A is specified for cosmetics, lip balm, hair care and a soap kettle that wants the natural odour. Grade B is often a refining or industrial-soap input. Grade C is refining feedstock when it is genuine shea at all — a dark, wet or chemically smelling lot should also be checked for identity, not merely re-graded.

Colour still confuses first-time buyers. Ivory to pale yellow is typical of unrefined Grade A; deeper yellow is common in Grade B; dark or grey-green is a warning, not a style. White butter that is sold as unrefined is usually refined, or it is not shea. Colour is one sensory input on the grade grid. It is not the grid. The colour grading page treats appearance as a specification. This page does not let appearance stand in for a grade.

Odour and texture are the two cells a photograph cannot show. Clean nutty is Grade A language. Stronger nutty or a light smoky note is commonly read as Grade B. Sharp, fermented or chemical odour is Grade C or a reject. Smooth, plastic butter with no grit or free water is Grade A texture; grain can still be acceptable in Grade B; oil separation, grit or wetness is Grade C sensory. None of those words is a laboratory colour score. The three numbers that still decide the letter are free fatty acid, peroxide value and moisture content.

Why N-RBD must not appear in the A/B/C column

Unrefined shea butter is pressed and filtered only. It keeps its colour, its odour and the unsaponifiable fraction that formulators specify shea for. It is the only butter that is graded A, B or C. Refined N-RBD — neutralised, bleached and deodorised — is a later process applied to crude butter. Free fatty acid and odour collapse, colour goes white, and some unsaponifiables are lost. The result is specified by its own free-fatty-acid, peroxide-value and colour limits. It is never "Grade A refined".

The confusion is commercial, not chemical. Buyers who want a white, odourless base sometimes write "Grade A N-RBD" because Grade A is the word they trust. That phrase mixes a quality class for unrefined butter with a refining process. A supplier can honestly ship a fully refined fat against that line and still have ignored every unrefined Grade A sensory expectation. Write one product or the other: unrefined Grade A, or refined N-RBD. Never both on one line.

Refining can take a Grade B or Grade C crude butter and produce a pale, low-FFA, low-odour fat. That is the point of neutralisation, bleaching and deodorisation. The refined result is not thereby Grade A. The history of the kernels — the lipase activity, the smoke, the moisture — is stripped from the smell and the free fatty acid, not from the fat's oxidative past. A freshly deodorised butter can still oxidise quickly if peroxide value was already high. Specify N-RBD by its own numbers, and ask for the batch COA, not for a grade letter that does not apply.

Refined N-RBD is a process, not a fourth grade. Specify it as refined N-RBD shea butter with its own FFA, peroxide value and colour limits — never as Grade A refined. The process is described in how shea butter is refined. See also refined N-RBD shea butter and the glossary definition of N-RBD.

Refined N-RBD shea butter is a processed product with its own specification; it is not Grade A, Grade B or Grade C. If you need neutrality for food, cocoa butter equivalent feedstock or a fragrance-sensitive cosmetic, specify N-RBD. If you need the ivory colour, nutty odour and unsaponifiable fraction, specify unrefined Grade A.

Roasting vs steam conditioning

Cold-pressed and warm-pressed describe kernel conditioning and the temperature at the press. They are not A/B/C grades. Cold-pressed means no heat is added at the press, not that the kernel was never warmed. Kernels are routinely boiled or parboiled after harvest to inactivate lipase; that step is collection practice, not a press setting, and it is why a cold-pressed butter can still carry high free fatty acid.

Roasting the kernel paste darkens colour and can add a smoky note. Buyers often read that note as Grade B sensory even when the free fatty acid would sit in a Grade A band. Steam or low-temperature conditioning keeps colour paler and odour milder. Neither method upgrades a fermented kernel. The chemistry was set in the village store, not in the expeller.

Traditional West African wet processing — roasting, milling, kneading with water, skimming and boiling — is a different route again. It can produce excellent butter in skilled hands and smoky, high-FFA butter in hurried ones. Mechanical cold-pressing is more repeatable; it is not, by itself, a grade. Ask for the conditioning method and the Certificate of Analysis together.

Buyers writing a first specification often bundle cold-pressed, unrefined and Grade A as if they were synonyms. They are three different claims. Cold-pressed is how the fat left the kernel. Unrefined is what was not done afterwards. Grade A is how the lot measured. A cold-pressed, unrefined butter from fermented nuts is still a high-FFA butter. A Grade A butter that was then refined is no longer Grade A; it is N-RBD. Keep the three claims on three lines if you need all of them.

Cold-pressed and warm-pressed describe kernel conditioning and press temperature; they are not shea butter grades. Put the process word on the purchase order if it matters to the formula, and put the grade letters on a different line.

How buyers should specify a grade on a PO

Do not write "Grade A" alone. A supplier who cannot show numbers cannot show a grade, and a one-word line invites the weakest reading of the word. The minimum purchase-order block is copy-ready:

• Product: unrefined shea butter, Grade A — or refined N-RBD; never both on one line
• Free fatty acid, peroxide value and moisture as the three numbers you require, or as the published regional Grade 1 band if that is the agreed reference
• Colour, odour and texture in words from the table above
• Test methods: AOCS / ISO — see the specifications hub
• Documents: batch COA and certificate of origin — see a sample Certificate of Analysis
• INCI: Butyrospermum Parkii (Shea) Butter

If you adopt the published regional Grade 1 band as the reference, say so on the order: "unrefined shea butter, Grade A, FFA, PV and moisture per ECOWAS/UEMOA Grade 1 as published on the supplier grades page." If you need tighter numbers than that regional band, write your numbers. Do not assume a supplier's house SOP matches the regional table, and do not assume this page's published bands are EMI Agro's contractual limits.

Identity parameters belong on the same order as identity, not as grade. Saponification value, refractive index, iodine value and unsaponifiable matter tell you whether the fat is shea. They do not tell you whether it is Grade A. A purchase order should name the grade and the three numbers that decide it — FFA, peroxide value and moisture — plus the COA requirement.

Adulteration signs

A low grade is not the same as a fake. Grade C can be genuine, badly handled shea — high free fatty acid from wet kernels, a smoky roast, grit from a dirty press. Adulteration is a different problem: something that is not shea, or shea bulked with another fat, water or starch. Re-grading a suspicious lot wastes a week; checking identity takes one afternoon.

Identity tests survive refining. A blend with palm, paraffin or a cheaper hard fat still shows on saponification value and refractive index after the butter has been made white and odourless. That is why those two lines are the first check, not a second grade. A melting point that does not behave like shea, or an unsaponifiable fraction far below the typical shea range, is the same kind of signal. Price and paperwork are the commercial pair: a lot offered well below the going Grade A range without a batch COA should be treated as an identity problem until proven otherwise.

Three signals are enough to open the full checklist:

• Saponification value or refractive index outside the shea identity range — refining cannot fix this. See saponification value and refractive index.
• Unsaponifiables far below the typical 4–11 % shea range, or a melting point that does not match shea. See unsaponifiable matter and melting point.
• A price that only works if the fat is not shea, a missing batch COA, or a lot that is white and claimed unrefined. See signs of adulterated shea butter and colour grading.

Out-of-range saponification value or refractive index is an identity signal, not a grade problem — and it is the reason to open the adulteration checklist, not to re-grade the lot. The COA interpreter walks the same lines a buyer should query first.

How EMI Agro treats grade

EMI Agro Industries manufactures in Ibadan and supplies two butter products: unrefined Grade A, cold-pressed and wild-collected, and refined N-RBD. Shea press cake is the pressing co-product. Grade B and Grade C appear on this page as market grades a buyer will meet elsewhere in the trade. They are not listed as EMI Agro supply SKUs.

Quality is set before the press. EMI Agro buys kernels through a cooperative network of more than 5,000 women collectors in Kwara, Niger, Kaduna and Kogi. Delay or damp storage raises free fatty acid in the kernel; pressing and filtration cannot take it out. That is why the grade conversation belongs in sourcing, not only in the laboratory after the expeller has run.

The factory sequence — intake, cleaning, conditioning, mechanical pressing with no heat added at the press, double filtration, testing, packing and export documents — is described on the About page. EMI Agro does not publish roast temperatures, intake-split percentages or collector grade-gate prices. Unrefined Grade A and refined N-RBD leave Ibadan with a batch Certificate of Analysis.

Finished batches are tested in the on-site laboratory before a Certificate of Analysis is issued. The COA is the batch record — the measured values against the agreed specification — not a typical data sheet. See Certifications & quality, a sample Certificate of Analysis and the About sourcing section for the facility and the cooperative model. EMI Agro produces to NIS 571:2013 as its published reference basis; contractual limits are those written on the order and restated on the COA.

The nine parameters behind a grade

The grade table uses six properties. A full specification uses nine: the three grade numbers, plus refractive index, saponification value, unsaponifiable matter, slip melting point, colour and iodine value. Colour appears in both lists because it is specified as appearance, not because it is a grade.