Franck Morel, farmer and producer

Réunion Island National Park

We were pleasantly surprised to be the 1,500th Esprit parc national product in France!

In Saint-Philippe, on the Souffleur d'Arbonne terroir, Bitasyon Bio is a family farm that has been certified in Organic Agriculture since 2006. On 7.5 hectares, Franck and Benoît Morel use agroforestry to grow fruit, vegetables, spices and vanilla, reintroducing endemic species to recreate a balanced ecosystem.

Committed to traditional recipes, they transform their harvests into jams, syrups, achards, powders and even chocolate, recognized as the 1,500ᵉ Esprit national park-marked product in France.

In their store, accessible to all, you'll find their creations but also other products from the Volcan massif, in a spirit of sharing and promoting the territory.

Here, we don't exploit. We cultivate and enhance our farmland.
We cultivate what grows in Saint-Philippe, we don't force things. So fruit trees, spices too, but also endemics, because for us endemics have their place on agricultural land. These are the first trees that were here before us, so it's important to reintroduce them and create an ecosystem that will balance itself.
We produce, but we also add value to our produce, whether it's jams, achards, syrups, but also anything with a vanilla base, as well as spices like turmeric or ginger.
We decided to use traditional recipes, but also to rework them to offer something new.
All our products are branded.
And for chocolate, we had the nice surprise of being the 1,500ᵉ Esprit parc nationalmarked product in France, so it's a great source of pride!
Cocoa must be grown in agroforestry: it needs trees to protect it, particularly from the wind and sun. It's not easy at first, and production remains very low.
My father was a pioneer in cocoa planting. He planted our first trees some fifteen years ago, and that's where I got my feet wet.
Today, we also take care of the chocolate-making side of things, transforming the cocoa beans into chocolate ourselves. We're totally self-taught, but our chocolate is starting to gain recognition.