Modern Coconut Management : Palm Cultivation And Products
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This text is aimed at guiding those who work with small-scale farmers and farmer groups through the complex area of coconut management. It should also be of value to the many processors and other people whose livelihoods depend on coconuts. The emphasis is on the need for training and education of coconut smallholders in how to become good managers, using appropriate techniques and materials. Modern Coconut Management combines information that exists in this areas with new research in diseases and pests, and breeding techniques to improve crop performance. It also deals with coconut based farming systems in which many aspects of the combination of coconuts with other crops and/or animals are discussed. Equally important are processing techniques which are vital to the survival of the coconut industry. There is a sectoin of Modern Coconut Management devoted to post-harvest treatment, processing and research where the many new developments in the processing of coconut products are discussed.
The coconut we buy in the store does not resemble the coconut you find growing on a coconut palm. An untouched coconut has three layers. The outermost layer, which is typically smooth with a greenish color, is called the exocarp. The next layer is the fibrous husk, or mesocarp, which ultimately surrounds the hard woody layer called the endocarp. The endocarp surrounds the seed. Generally speaking, when you buy a coconut at the supermarket the exocarp and the mesocarp are removed and what you see is the endocarp.
Odoardo Beccari, a renowned palm specialist from the early 20th century, suggests that the coconut is of Old World origin and more than likely came from the Indian Archipelago or Polynesia. To strengthen his argument, there are more varieties of coconut palms in the Eastern hemisphere than in the Americas.
The coconut tree (Cocos nucifera) is a member of the palm tree family (Arecaceae) and the only living species of the genus Cocos.[1] The term \"coconut\" (or the archaic \"cocoanut\")[2] can refer to the whole coconut palm, the seed, or the fruit, which botanically is a drupe, not a nut. The name comes from the old Portuguese word coco, meaning \"head\" or \"skull\", after the three indentations on the coconut shell that resemble facial features. They are ubiquitous in coastal tropical regions and are a cultural icon of the tropics.
True-to-type dwarf varieties of Pacific coconuts have been cultivated by the Austronesian peoples since ancient times. These varieties were selected for slower growth, sweeter coconut water, and often brightly-colored fruits.[11] Many modern different varieties are also grown, including the Maypan coconut, King coconut, and Macapuno. These vary by the taste of the coconut water and color of the fruit, as well as other genetic factors.[12]
Further complicating measures to determine the evolutionary history of Cocos is the genetic diversity present within C. nucifera as well as its relatedness to other palms. Phylogenetic evidence supports the closest relatives of Cocos being either Syagrus or Attalea, both of which are found in South America. However, Cocos is not thought to be indigenous to South America, and the highest genetic diversity is present in Asian Cocos, indicating that at least the modern species Cocos nucifera is native to there. In addition, fossils of potential Cocos ancestors have been recovered from both Colombia and India. In order to resolve this enigma, a 2014 study proposed that the ancestors of Cocos had likely originated on the Caribbean coast of what is now Colombia, and during the Eocene the ancestral Cocos performed a long-distance dispersal across the Atlantic Ocean to North Africa. From here, island-hopping via coral atolls lining the Tethys Sea, potentially boosted by the ocean currents at the time, would have proved crucial to dispersal, eventually allowing ancestral coconuts to reach India. The study contended that an adaptation to coral atolls would explain the prehistoric and modern distributions of Cocos, would have provided the necessary evolutionary pressures, and would account for morphological factors such as a thick husk to protect against ocean degradation and provide a moist medium in which to germinate on sparse atolls.[33]
Modern genetic studies have identified the center of origin of coconuts as being the Central Indo-Pacific, the region between western Southeast Asia and Melanesia, where it shows greatest genetic diversity.[45][24][48][49] Their cultivation and spread was closely tied to the early migrations of the Austronesian peoples who carried coconuts as canoe plants to islands they settled.[48][49][50][51] The similarities of the local names in the Austronesian region is also cited as evidence that the plant originated in the region. For example, the Polynesian and Melanesian term niu; Tagalog and Chamorro term niyog; and the Malay word nyiur or nyior.[52][53] Other evidence for a Central Indo-Pacific origin is the native range of the coconut crab; and the higher amounts of C. nucifera-specific insect pests in the region (90%) in comparison to the Americas (20%), and Africa (4%).[4]
Wild coconuts are naturally restricted to coastal areas in sandy, saline soils. The fruit is adapted for ocean dispersal. Coconuts could not reach inland locations without human intervention (to carry seednuts, plant seedlings, etc.) and early germination on the palm (vivipary) was important.[59]
The niu vai form is the domesticated form dominant in the Pacific coconuts. They were selected for by the Austronesian peoples for their larger endosperm-to-husk ratio as well as higher coconut water content, making them more useful as food and water reserves for sea voyages. The decreased buoyancy and increased fragility of this spherical, thin-husked fruit would not matter for a species that had started to be dispersed by humans and grown in plantations.[18][19] Niu vai endocarp fragments have been recovered in archaeological sites in the St. Matthias Islands of the Bismarck Archipelago. The fragments are dated to approximately 1000 BCE, suggesting that cultivation and artificial selection of coconuts were already practiced by the Austronesian Lapita people.[4]
Drift models based on wind and ocean currents have shown that coconuts could not have drifted across the Pacific unaided.[57] If they were naturally distributed and had been in the Pacific for a thousand years or so, then we would expect the eastern shore of Australia, with its own islands sheltered by the Great Barrier Reef, to have been thick with coconut palms: the currents were directly into, and down along this coast. However, both James Cook and William Bligh[69] (put adrift after the Bounty mutiny) found no sign of the nuts along this 2,000 km (1,200 mi) stretch when he needed water for his crew. Nor were there coconuts on the east side of the African coast until Vasco da Gama, nor in the Caribbean when first visited by Christopher Columbus. They were commonly carried by Spanish ships as a source of fresh water.
The coconut palm is damaged by the larvae of many Lepidoptera (butterfly and moth) species which feed on it, including the African armyworm (Spodoptera exempta) and Batrachedra spp.: B. arenosella, B. atriloqua (feeds exclusively on C. nucifera), B. mathesoni (feeds exclusively on C. nucifera), and B. nuciferae.[74]
Brontispa longissima (coconut leaf beetle) feeds on young leaves, and damages both seedlings and mature coconut palms. In 2007, the Philippines imposed a quarantine in Metro Manila and 26 provinces to stop the spread of the pest and protect the Philippine coconut industry managed by some 3.5 million farmers.[75]
In Kerala, India, the main coconut pests are the coconut mite, the rhinoceros beetle, the red palm weevil, and the coconut leaf caterpillar. Research into countermeasures to these pests has as of 2009[update] yielded no results; researchers from the Kerala Agricultural University and the Central Plantation Crop Research Institute, Kasaragode, continue to work on countermeasures. The Krishi Vigyan Kendra, Kannur under Kerala Agricultural University has developed an innovative extension approach called the compact area group approach to combat coconut mites.
A system of bamboo bridges and ladders directly connecting the tree canopies are also utilized in the Philippines for coconut plantations that harvest coconut sap (not fruits) for coconut vinegar and palm wine production.[91][85] In other areas, like in Papua New Guinea, coconuts are simply collected when they fall to the ground.[78]
The practice of using macaques to harvest coconuts was exposed in Thailand by the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) in 2019, resulting in calls for boycotts on coconut products. PETA later clarified that the use of macaques is not practiced in the Philippines, India, Brazil, Colombia, Hawaii, and other major coconut-producing regions.[85]
In cooler climates (but not less than USDA Zone 9), a similar palm, the queen palm (Syagrus romanzoffiana), is used in landscaping. Its fruits are similar to the coconut, but smaller. The queen palm was originally classified in the genus Cocos along with the coconut, but was later reclassified in Syagrus. A recently discovered palm, Beccariophoenix alfredii from Madagascar, is nearly identical to the coconut, more so than the queen palm and can also be grown in slightly cooler climates than the coconut palm. Coconuts can only be grown in temperatures above 18 C (64 F) and need a daily temperature above 22 C (72 F) to produce fruit.[citation needed]
Two important coconut products were first developed in the Philippines, macapuno and nata de coco. Macapuno is a coconut variety with a jelly-like coconut meat. Its meat is sweetened, cut into strands, and sold in glass jars as coconut strings, sometimes labeled as \"coconut sport\". Nata de coco, also called coconut gel, is another jelly-like coconut product made from fermented coconut water.[101][102] 153554b96e
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