Oil palm

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Oil palm

African Oil Palm (Elaeis guineensis)

Scientific classification

Kingdom:	Plantae
Division:	Magnoliophyta
Class:	Liliopsida
Order:	Arecales
Family:	Arecaceae
Genus:	Elaeis Jacq.

Species

Elaeis guineensis
Elaeis oleifera

The oil palms (Elaeis) comprise two species of the Arecaceae, or palm family. They are used in commercial agriculture in the production of palm oil. The African Oil Palm Elaeis guineensis is native to west Africa, occurring between Angola and Gambia, while the American Oil Palm Elaeis oleifera is native to tropical Central America and South America.

Mature trees are single-stemmed, and grow to 20 m tall. The leaves are pinnate, and reach between 3-5 m long. A young tree produces about 30 leaves a year. Established trees over 10 years produce about 20 leaves a year. The flowers are produced in dense clusters; each individual flower is small, with three sepals and three petals. The fruit takes five to six months to mature from pollination to maturity; it comprises an oily, fleshy outer layer (the pericarp), with a single seed (kernel), also rich in oil. Unlike its relative, the Coconut Palm, the oil palm does not produce offshoots; propagation is by sowing the seeds.

[edit] Agriculture

African Oil Palm (Elaeis guineensis)

Oil palms are grown for their clusters of fruit, which can weigh 40-50 kg. Upon harvest, the drupe, pericarp and seeds are used for production of soap and edible vegetable oil; different grades of oil quality are obtained from the pericarp and the kernel, with the pericarp oil used mainly for cooking oil, and the kernel oil used in processed foods.

For each hectare of oil palm, which is harvested year-round, the annual production averages 10 tonnes of fruit, which yields 3,000 kg of pericarp oil, and 750 kg of seed kernels, which yield 250 kg of high quality palm kernel oil as well as 500 kg of kernel meal. The meal is used to feed livestock. Some varieties have even higher productivities which has led to their consideration for producing the vegetable oil needed for biodiesel.

The African Oil Palm was introduced to Sumatra and the Malaya area in the early 1900s; many of the largest plantations of oil palms are now in this area, with Malaysia growing over 20,000 square kilometres. Malaysia claims that in 1995 it was the world's largest producer with 51% of world production. In this area, the destruction of natural rainforest to grow oil palm plantations is an issue of major environmental concern.

[edit] Cultivation

Fruit of oil palm tree

The oil palm is a tropical palm tree. There are two species of oil palm, the better known one is the one originating from Guinea, Africa and was first illustrated by Nicholaas Jacquin in 1763, hence its name, Elaeis guineensis Jacq.

The fruit is reddish about the size of a large plum and grows in large bunches. A bunch of fruits can weigh between 10 to 40 kilograms each. Each fruit contains a single seed (the palm kernel) surrounded by a soft oily pulp. Oil is extracted from both the pulp of the fruit (palm oil, an edible oil) and the kernel (palm kernel oil, used mainly for soap manufacture).

For every 100 kilograms of fruit bunches, typically 22 kilograms of palm oil and 1.6 kilograms of palm kernel oil can be extracted.

The high productivity of the oil palm at producing oil (as high as 7,250 liters per hectare per year) has made it the prime source of vegetable oil for many tropical countries. It is also likely to be used for producing the necessary vegetable oil for biodiesel, an example being a planned refinery Darwin, Australia which will import the palm oil from Indonesia and Malaysia.

The oil palm originated in West Africa but has since been planted successfully in tropical regions within 20 degrees of the equator. There is evidence of palm oil use in Ancient Egypt.

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Oil palm plantations in the municipality of Aracataca, Colombia.

In the Republic of the Congo, or Congo Brazzaville, precisely in the Northern part, not far from Ouesso, local people produce this oil by hand. They harvest the fruit, boil it to let the water part evaporate, then they press what its left in order to collect the reddish, orange colored oil.

The world's largest producer and exporter of palm oil today is Malaysia, producing about 47% of the world's supply of palm oil. Indonesia is the second largest world producer of palm oil producing approximately 36% of world palm oil volume. Both nations are expanding their palm oil production capacity and the market continues to grow.

Worldwide palm oil production during the 2005-2006 growing season was 39.8 million metric tons, of which 4.3 million tons was in the form of palm kernel oil. It is thus by far the most widely-produced tropical oil, and constitutes thirty-four percent of total edible oil production worldwide.^[1]