Is Plant-Based Dry Fruit Anjeer Actually Non Vegetarian?

Figs play a key role in digestion, improving heart health, blood sugar and blood pressure maintenance, weight management, increased bone density, preventing the formation of renal calculi (kidney stones), and also providing energy to the body and immune system by the presence of vitamin C and flavonoids. Due to its high calcium, potassium, iron, and magnesium content, it is the most sought-after nutrition-balancing food option. 

Is Anjeer Non-Vegetarian?

Shenaz Treasurywala, an actor and travel vlogger recently took to Instagram and shared a reel explaining how figs are actually 'non-vegetarian!' She captioned it as, 

‘A female wasp crawls into the tiny opening of the fig flower to lay her eggs in there. During this process, her antennas and wings will be broken off, causing her to die very soon after that. Your lovely fruit then digests the wasp’s body using an enzyme. Her eggs hatched right there, some mating happens, and then the baby crawls from the fig with pollen attached to them, continuing on with the bee’s lifecycle.
For every fig consumed, it’s likely that a bee died for it to come to fruition, a fact that some vegetarians are uncomfortable with.’

See Shenaz Treasurywala Post

While her post did get a buzz over the fact whether figs are vegetarian or not, here's what we know!

According to Plant Based News, 'Wasp-fig pollination is a wholly natural process and doesn’t involve human-led exploitation of animals, which veganism seeks to exclude. The eggs that the female lays within the fig will exit while still larvae, meaning she is giving way to more life by dying. Both the fig and wasp have evolved that way, and the process is not comparable to unnatural farming practices.'

Digestion of wasps happens within the fig with the help of the ficin enzyme. Ficin breaks down the bodies of wasps into protein. Hence, the crunchiness of the fig is not derived from the body of the wasp.

This has gained mixed reactions and definitions of consuming vegetarian food. According to some, Anjeer, due to involving loss of life of the wasp may be considered non-vegetarian, while some still believe that figs are vegan, as the nature of fig-wasp pollination is mutualism and happens without any human interference. It, therefore, does not show any form of animal exploitation for human benefit.  

Are There Any Wasp Free Figs Available?

Farmers have developed the technique of farming figs without wasps. This technique is called parthenocarpy, a process of fertilization without the production of fruit, ie seedless fruits! Parthenocarpic figs like Brown Turkey, Mission, Celeste, Poona, and Kadota are a few species falling under this category. 

While the debate about figs being vegetarian or not ensues, thanks to modern farming techniques, the figs you are consuming might be parthenocarpically derived, which definitely did not involve the life of a wasp!