Tag: african oil palm

AFRICAN OIL PALM

AFRICAN OIL PALM

 

 

ELAEIS GUINEENSIS jacq.

 

Local name: African oil palm (Engl.).

 

The African oil palm was brought into the Philippines some time the middle of the last century. It is cultivated in the Manila and in larger towns as an ornamental. Seeds of improved strains were introduced by the author in 1938 from Kuala Lumpur and are now grow by the Bureau of Plant Industry. It is grown extensively in west in West Africa, its original home, and in Malaya, Sumatra, Java, India, and the United State.

 

The trunk is erect, attaining a height of 4 of 10 meters. The leaves are numerous, and 3 to 3.5 meters long. The petioles are broad, and are armed on the sides with spinescent, reduced leaves. The leaflets are numerous, linear-lanceolate, nearly 1 meter long, 2 or 4 meters wide. The male inflorescence in dense, having numerous, cylindric spikes which are 7 to 12 centimeters long and about 1 centimeters in diameters; their rachises excurrent as a stout awn. The female inflorescences is dense, branched, 20 to 30 centimeters long, and the flowers densely disposed. The fruit is borne in large dense masses.

 

The palm yields two kinds of oil: the palm oil and palm-kernel oil. The palm oil is chiefly used for manufacture of soaps and candles. It consists principally of palmitin and olein. The palm-kernel oil is used for making vegetable butter. According to Burkill the kernel oil consists chiefly of the glyceride of lauric acid, together with palmitic, oleic and myristic acid, some caprylic acids and capric acid and phytosterin. In Africa much wine is made from the trees. For details of chemical constituents, see Wehmer.

The palm is not known medically in the Philippines. However, Caius reports that in Guinea the oil is applied to wounds as a vulnerary. It is used also as a liniment for rheumatism and courbature. The bubis of the Island of Fernando  make an excellent poultice of the oil, which is applied to wounds. In Equatorial West Africa. According to him, the roots are used as a diuretic and the fresh sap, as a laxative.

Source:  BPI

Plants – Possible Sources of Energy

Plants – Possible Sources of Energy

There are many plants where we can derive energy not only as fuel but also as raw materials

for power generation such as oil, sap or turpentine. These could be processed into petroleum,

gasoline and related products. Some of these plants are:

 

1. Petroleum fruit — this is commonly called abkol, oil, dingo, sagaga and salkel. The plant

generally grows in Cebu, Bicol, Palawan, Nueva Ecija, Nueva Viscaya and Benguet.

– The fruit can be used for medicine aside from fuel. 52 grams of concentrated oil can be

taken from a kilo of this fruit and another 16 grams of oil can be expelled when the residue is

grinded.

– According to Phil. Pigment and Resin Corporation diagnosis, the fruit contains 12.35 of

leptine (one of the elements of gasoline) of oil.

– The plants can be propagated through seeds and twigs.

 

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