Agroforestry.org - Multipurpose Palms

Written by Franklin W. Martin | Edited by Craig Elevitch. Posted in Multipurpose Palms

CHAPTER 4

As a boy I learned that bread is the staff of life, a life-sustaining food containing moat of the nutrients humankind requires. Yet, as a man I now know the strengths and weaknesses of bread as a food. Much nearer to a staff of life are many of the palms. Because of their multiple uses they can come near to supplying not only the food humankind needs, but shelter as well, and many useful articles around the house. Frequently they are a useful feed for animals as well. Thus, these can be called life sustaining palms.

Only a few of the many palms with multiple purposes are in fact life sustaining. This is because many have never been developed for their potentialities. usually the palm that is life sustaining is widely adapted within a certain region. People of diverse cultures have learned to use these palms for many purposes. There is a certain similarity in the uses to which these vital palms are put, yet each is unique as well, in origin, distribution, appearance, and in some of its uses.

The uses of 5 palms (Fig. 2, 3), each life sustaining in certain distinct regions, are emphasized here (Table 5).

Table 5. Edible And Other Uses Of Five Palms*

	Date	Palmyra	Doum	Buriti
Entire palm	Sand stabilization	Elephant trails	Arid forests	Marks water
Trunks	All trunks used as wood subatitutea in construction.
Roots	Roots of only minor or medicinal uses.
Terminal bud	The terminal buds of all are sometimes used as salad.
Leaf blade	All are used in thatching, weaving, construction.
Useful fibers	Several	Leaf, sheath	Primitive	Strong
Inflorescence	All are used for sap, toddy, and sugar, or more.
Immature fruit
Pulp	Cooked	Cooked	Edible	----
Kernel	----	Edible Jelly	Edible	----
Mature fruit
Fruit pulp	Edible	Edible raw	Edible	Preserves
Kernel	Edible	----	As ivory	For oil
Germinating	----	As vegetable	----	Edible

* The coconut is not included in this table because of more adequate coverage in table 4 of chapter 3.

The coconut palm

Because Chapter 3 is dedicated to the coconut, this important palm will not be discussed again except to remind everyone that this is the best palm of all, the most versatile and useful.

The date palm

The date palm, Phoenix dactylifera, with its strong upright trunk, its long pinnate leaves, and its heavy clusters of fruit is a sure sign of the richness of the desert. With an origin in Mesopotamia (Iraq), the date has become a virtual staff of life for the desert regions of North Africa and the Near East, and has been introduced successfully to other countries with similar climates. Yet, its great importance is confined to its original areas of distribution. Date palms require a hot, dry area for producing and maturing their fruits, and while quite adept at retrieving water from the soil, they are always found around oases, streams, wells, or irrigation canals. Date palms are dioecious, and thus the male must always be nearby. While pollinated by wind, it is advantageous to attach part of the male inflorescence to the female to insure adequate pollination. By a phenomenon known as metaxenia, the male parent, through its pollen, influences many characteristics of the fruit including earliness and size. Successful date culture is having the right climate, the right varieties, and the right techniques.

While the fruit types are classified as soft, medium dry, and dry, there are many varieties used in different ways, and prepared for different purposes. Four stages of maturation are recognized, and even at the second stage, green, immature fruits, the fruits are edible cooked. The seeds as well, small as they are, can be cracked and eaten. For some people, dates may be the moat important and frequently eaten fruit throughout the entire year. Because the trees themselves are so important, they are never sacrificed for the edible cabbage or terminal bud, but the inflorescence or apical region may be tapped for the sap, used for its many uses.

The palmyra palm

Another giant of arid regions, the palmyra palm, sometimes called the African fan palm, Borassus aethiopicum (B. flabellifer, two closely related or perhaps identical species), is dioecious, upright, stout, with tremendous costa-palmate leaves and clusters of large fruits. Its unusual swollen trunk is sometimes hollowed out as a storage place. Usually near the sea or in coastal valleys, it is found on the edges of desert regions from East Africa and India to Indonesia, both wild and planted by local peoples who depend for their welfare on this palm.

While the pulp of the immature fruit is eaten cooked, or of the mature, raw, it is the sap which is of special value, and its techniques of collection have been developed to an art, and its purposes are multiple. In India the principal use is as palm sugar, jaggery. The kernel of the young nut is edible, as is the germinating nut. While the cabbage is edible, to eat it would mean eliminating a very valuable tree. A very unusual use is of sections of the leave, used to write on with a stylus, and these are then bound as books. Used in construction and weaving as well as fuel are very typical of those of other palms.

The Doum Palm

The doum or gingerbread palm, Hyphaene thebaica, is a dioecious, usually branched palm of 2, 4, 8, or 16 heads of fan-shaped leaves. It occurs as dense, fire-resistant forests of coastal arid regions from East Africa to India. While it is propagated from seeds, which take a very long time to become eatablished, it can also be planted from suckers originating at the base.

The vegetative parts of the doum palm, trunk and leaves, are used much as are those of other palms in weaving and construction. In addition, the young, still not unfolded leaves are used for weaving versatile mats. The sap obtained from tapping the apex of the palm has the usual multiple purpose, but its use is prohibited in some countries because of the alcoholic toddy. The fruit pulp has the smell of gingerbread, hence one name of the palm. It is used in cooking in various ways, and varieties differ in their edibility. While the unripe kernel is edible, the ripe kernel is too hard and used only as a vegetable ivory.

To the peoples of the deserts where doum palms are found, this palm is a life-sustaining blessing.

The Buriti Palm

The buriti palm, also with several other names in Spanish and Portuguese, Mauritia vinifera or M. flexuosa, is a palm of the Amazon basin and of the humid regions to the south. A tall palm with palmately divided leaves, it requires a large space, about 30 feet apart, and a constantly humid soil. It bears large, long clusters of fruit, each about 2 inches long, the individual fruits covered with scales. This palm, and several related to it, is a life sustaining palm in Brazil. It is used from the wild, but also now cultivated in plantations.

In addition to the typical uses of the vegetative parts in construction and weaving, this palm is especially useful for its foods. The sap is especially good for its typical uses. The pulp of the fruit is delicious, used fresh, in candies and other confections, and in drinks. The kernel of the nut is large and has a high content of useful oil.

Thus, it is a surprise to find so many similarities in uses among the five life sustaining palms considered, and one wonders how many other such palms there might be, especially in the humid tropics, that need only thoughtful attention to become important crops for humankind.

Written by Franklin W. Martin | Edited by Craig Elevitch. Posted in Multipurpose Palms

CHAPTER 3

7798CElevitch

Is there any palm more beautiful than the coconut? Gracefully reclining on the beach as if bending with the wind, its crown of pinnate fronds dancing in the breeze, there is no doubt of its physical beauty, yet the coconut has another kind of beauty, its intimate relation to humankind over history and even at the present through the uses found for it. The coconut, Cocos nucifera, is without a doubt the best palm of the world based on its products and its uses for people. The date palm, a close rival, is less well adapted and therefore is of great importance in a much smaller geographic region. The oil palm undoubtedly of great importance, is well adapted but much less useful than the coconut. This marvelous palm and its many uses will be described here.

The coconut throughout the world

The coconut was well distributed before the age of European exploration, making its origin difficult to trace. While the plants most related to the coconut are found in Northwest South America, before Columbus the coconut was known on only a small part of the Pacific coast and not at all on the Atlantic coast of South or Central America. The evidence is varied and controversial, but most probably the original coconut developed in the area from Southeast Asia to the Pacific islands, where coconut culture is well advanced. Adapted to disbursal by the seas, the coconut could have been distributed even without the help of humankind, although the roles of humans in selecting and transporting coconuts are evident. While the coconut today is produced throughout the tropics, nevertheless the most important regions of production are still the islands of the South Pacific, the Philippine islands, Malaysia, Indonesia, and Sri Lanka. This concentration of production in one region does not negate the fact that the coconut is well known and important in all parts of the tropics.

The coconut is broadly adapted to the tropics. While associated with the seashore and thus with lands near sea level, the coconut can be found in large inland plantations in some countries, and is frequently seen as well in the foothills of the mountains. It cannot tolerate much frost, however, nor extremes of either flooding or drought. While usually found in sands, coconuts can be grown in a wide variety of soils.

Coconuts are highly varied. Roughly divided into two kinds, the tall and the dwarf, the first varies in shape and size of the nut and the husk which surrounds it, and in the special uses for which a variety is used, as a drink, for the soft pulp, or for the mature pulp. The dwarf varieties are more resistant to lethal yellowing, a fatal disease of palms, and include external fruit colors ranging from green to yellow to orange and even red. While the tall coconuts are cross pollinated, as the rule the dwarfs pollinate themselves.

Table 4. The uses of the coconut palm.

Part of the Palm Uses	Relative Importance of uses
Entire palm	Shade for other crops	High
	Light shade for pastures	Very high
	Beauty in landscapes and gardens	Very high
Trunk	Timbers for construction	Medium
	Sawed planks for construction	Low
	Extraction of starch	Low
	Hardest wood for veneers and carving	Medium
Roots	Extracted for medicines	Low
	Toasted, ground as coffee substitute.	Low
	Carved as tooth picks	Low
Terminal bud	Removed as palm cabbage, thus killing	Low but only the palm because palms are so useful
Petiole of leaf	Used as a timber in construction	Very high
	A pole for many applications	High
	Used as fuel	Medium
Blade of leaf	Thatching	High
	Fencing	High
	Weaving	Very high
	In bundles as torches	Low
Inflorescence	Tapped as a source of sap, used for drink, toddy, vinegar, sugar, arrack	High
	Source of yeast for bread	Medium
Flowers and pollen	Added to other foods	Very low
Immature fruit	Used as a source of drink	High
Mature fruit	Uses as a source of edible "jelly"	Medium
Husk	Processed as coir fiber	High
	Coir used as rooting medium	Medium
	Uses as fuel	Medium
Shell	Used to make utensils and ornaments	High
	Used to make charcoal	Low
Pulp of nut	Used as a fresh food	Medium
	Grated and extracted as "milk"	High
	Dried and used as condiment	Medium
	Used as animal feed	High
Extracted oil	Used in foods, margarine	Very high
	In soaps, cosmetics, illuminants	High
	As hair oil and oil for the body	Very high
Residue after	As an animal feed	High extraction
Liquid	As a beverage	Medium
	Used in cooking	High
Germinating nut	Cooked as a vegetable	High

Ecological roles of the coconut

The coconut is seldom or ever planted for its ecological roles, yet, because of the vast areas of the tropics covered by coconut plantations, the coconut does play an important part ecologically. As a light shade, the coconut lends itself to forms of multistoried planting. Very commonly animals are pastured on natural or improved grasses below the shade, which, in time, can compact some soils and reduce the yields of the coconuts. Less harmful is the production of other crops, shade-tolerant shrubs and trees including banana, cacao, and coffee, or annual plantings of annual and perennial vegetables. The yields of these vegetables are usually not as high as they would be in full sun, yet, it is profitable to make use of the coconut plantation in this way as well

With time the coconut plantation produces large quantities of residues, the old leaves and the unused coir, materials that rot slowly and are useful in reducing erosion, and in filling gullies.

Uses of the coconut for food

The most important uses of the coconut are summarized in Table 4. The uses as food are quite varied, and most of them are centered around the nut, whether mature or green. The peoples of the world have discovered an amazing variety of uses that depend in part on the variety and its characteristics, and on the maturity of the nut. For example, the liquid of the immature nut is a refreshing drink, but the liquid of the mature nut, while of good taste, is more likely to loosen the bowels. The liquid of the nut is not the same as the "milk". This name refers to the juice extracted from the grated kernel, by pressing or wringing in a cloth, with or without first adding some water. Rich in oil, the liquid is white and milky in appearance, and of high nutritive value (oil, carbohydrates, protein). It is mixed into many kinds of food.

Oddly, the mature kernel is not used at the household level as frequently as the "milk", yet has its major use in the production of copra, dried coconut kernel, pressed for the extraction of oil which has many uses as food (cooking oil, condiments, pastries, margarine) as well as personal uses (hair and anointments), and a very wide variety of industrial uses. The residue after extraction of oil is a fibrous cake rich also in protein, which is used as an animal feed.

While the terminal bud or cabbage is highly prized as a food, and while the trunks can be used for the manufacture of starch (sago), these uses are destructive and are practiced only in emergency or when old palms are destroyed by storm or are removed. However, the sap of the inflorescence is highly prized for its many uses. The tapping of the inflorescence for the sap is a difficult art which may include beating of the inflorescence and shaving away a small portion each day to keep the sap flowing. The sap can be used fresh as a beverage, but more often it is permitted to ferment naturally, providing an alcoholic toddy. Still later fermentation leads to the production of vinegar. The best arrack, the distilled spirits of toddy, comes from the coconut palm. The brown sugar, jaggery, obtained by boiling the sap, is a familiar and useful food item in many parts of the world.

Even the germinating nut has its uses. The ball of roots within the nut (haustorium) is prized as a cooked vegetable.

Finally, the uses of various parts of the coconut palm as medicines must be mentioned, although these uses are so numerous and sometimes controversial that they cannot be even listed here.

Non-food uses of coconut

The extraction of copra for oil and its consequent use for food and for industrial purposes has been for many years the primary importance of the coconut on the international market. However, at the level of the farm the uses of coconut for non-food purposes are many, and for the small land holder, these uses may be as important as the food uses. This is especially true in the uses of the palm for construction. The trunks make good, heavy foundation supports of the house. The trunk can also be sawed to boards for floors. The petioles and midribs of the leaves are useful in frameworks for walls and roofs, and the leaves themselves are used in thatching. The leaflets may be woven into mats for the floor or as panels for walls.

Many household items are made from the coconut palm. Containers and utensils are made from the shell of the nut. The leaves are woven into many products. The coir fiber is used in mattresses. The fuel of the household may come from parts of the coconut palm, directly or after conversion to charcoal. The oil is used in lamps, and bundles of leaflets are used in torches.

Surely the coconut palm is more that a staff of life. In some regions it is the basis for human survival. Yet, the coconut palm may also be thought of as a model, illustrating the many uses to which palms can be put. This will be evident in the coming chapters as other palms are discussed.

Written by Franklin W. Martin | Edited by Craig Elevitch. Posted in Multipurpose Palms

Chapter 2

How are palms used around the world? It might take considerable study to find all the ways. More than 800 uses have been recorded for the date palm alone, for it is the very foundation of life for several cultures. One might divide the uses into three classes: for ecological purposes, for food, and for other uses.

Ecological Uses

Palms are seldom used purposely for ecological purposes, yet they play a great role in the ecology of the tropical forest, for they are, in size, from small and almost insignificant understory plants to large and dominating beauties of the forest. They are shelter for numerous birds and small animals. In the axils of the old leaves other plants such as ferns, orchids, and bromeliads grow, and their unique insects are many in number. Palms are principal sources of food for many birds and mammals. Some may fly to or climb the palms in search of the fruits, while others find the fruits on the ground below. Even the foliage serves as food for some animals.

On the farm the principal domesticated species have a limited number of ecological functions. Coconut groves give a light shade that can improve the yields of some crops like taro and its relatives. The long leaves of cultivated palms add to the tangle of decaying organic material to provide a constant return of minerals and organic matter to the soil.

Uses as Food

Almost all parts of the palm can be used as food in some cases, as shown in Table 2. The three most common food uses are of the sap, the accumulated starch, or the growing tip. The tapping of the inflorescence or the apex of the palm yields sap, which can be made into a fresh drink, or fermented into toddy, or then distilled into arrack. The sap can also be boiled to yield palm sugar, jaggery. The accumulated starch is harvested from the trunk of mature palms, and becomes not only a staple food but an industrial product as well. The third common use is of the growing tip hidden among the bases of the leaves. The tender tip, eaten raw or cooked, is frequently called millionaire's salad. Harvesting the tip destroys the trunk, and thus the best species for this purpose are those with multiple trunks. The above general uses are shared by many, many species of palms.

In contrast, the edible qualities of the inflorescence, the flower, the pollen, the fruit pulp, and the nut inside vary with each species and it is difficult to be sure of these uses without careful trial.

Table 2. The Edible Uses of Palms

Material	Raw Product	Refined Product
From sap	toddy, wine	Vinegar, arrack
	sugar, jaggery
From bud	palm cabbage
From flower cluster	As cooked vegetable
	Flowers candied
	Pollen as food
	Nectar for bees
From fruit pulp	Fresh	Cooked or candied
		Mixed in drinks
		In "vinho"
	Fermented	In "wine"
	Extracted	For cooking oil
	Extracted	For medicine
From nut	Fresh	For drinking
		Raw or roasted
		As vegetable ivory
		As drug or stimulant
	Extracted	For oil and medicine
	Germinated	For edible root ball
	Shell	For oil
From trunk	Sago	For starch
From roots	Medicines

Other uses of the palms

The principal non-food uses of palms are summarized in Table 3. One very important use is for construction. Because the trunks and leaves may be long, they often contain tough fibers that are quite useful. The trunks, entire or cut into planks, and the petioles as well as the rib of the leaf are often used to support buildings, or as a framework, or even as floors. The leaves are woven in many ways to make useful mats and are often used in thatching of walls and roofs. Very thin trunks of viny palms are the sources of rattan used in furniture.

Useful wax is removed from some species, from the trunk, the mature leaves or even the young, unfolded leaves. This is an article of commerce such as carnauba wax. The fibers can be removed by hand after retting (partial rotting in water), or by hand techniques. Many woody parts of the plants are used for making charcoal. But, this is not all, for native peoples have found ways to use even the thorns of some species.

Finally, some plant parts, especially the foliage, but also the trunks of some starchy palms are used for animal feed, especially during drought.

Table 3. Other useful products of the palms.

Trunks:	As timbers, planks, fiber, rattan, charcoal, starch for pig feed
Fronds or leaves:	For fences, thatching, weaving, arrow shafts, fiber, wax, fodder;
	Part of leaf to write on
Roots:	Medicines
Thorns:	Arrow tips
Fruit husks:	Fiber
Seeds:	Ornaments
Nut shells:	Utensils, or for charcoal
Oils:	Soap making

Written by Franklin W. Martin | Edited by Craig Elevitch. Posted in Multipurpose Palms

Chapter 1

Among the plants of the Tropics it is difficult to find a family of plants of more service to people than the palm family (Palmae, Arecaceae). In fact, this family has been called the most versatile of all due to its many uses. A better known family and still more important as a source of food is the grass family for the principal crops it provides, wheat, rice and corn. Yet the grass family has few other uses compared with the palm family.

Palms seldom receive the recognition they merit, perhaps because the family is almost entirely of the tropics, and almost completely absent in temperate zones where there are more writers of books and magazines as well as researchers. This handbook hopes to remedy in part this neglect and to make known to its readers some of the most important palms and their uses. It also aims to stimulate readers to grow and use palms with the belief that these plants can be of much, much more service. Furthermore, the palms are one of the largest and most agreeable parts of the tropical landscape.

The structure of palms:

With its simple structure, it is difficult to imagine all of the purposes a palm can serve. The palm usually has a simple trunk with a network of roots in the soil and a long or spatulate leaves, called fronds, originating at the top from a single bud. Flowers are produced in clusters which arise from the axils of the leaves. These may be male, female, or hermaphroditic. From the female flower parts a fruits arises which may have a fleshy or fibrous outer coat, a hard inner coat, and a somewhat hard, often hollow endosperm. Almost all palms are variations of this theme. Because the palm normally has only a single growing tip, damage or destruction of the tip often results in the death of the palm.

Records Involving Palms

Palms beat records in many ways, as follows:

Most versatile plant family in total uses:	Palmae
Most versatile plant family in food uses:	Palmae
World’s longest woody vines:	Rattan palms
World’s longest leaves:	Raffia palms, 65 ft.
World’s longest inflorescence:	Talipot palm
Palm that dies after fruiting:	Talipot and others
Palm that flowers from top down, then dies:	Fishtail palms
World’s largest seed:	Double coconut
World’s hardest seed:	Ivory palm
World’s tallest palm:	Ceroxylon, 200 ft.
World’s single best starch source:	Metroxylon
The branched palms:	Gingerbread palms, Hyphaene
A narcotic seed that is chewed:	Betel palm
Most versatile plant in the world:	Coconut palm