Closely related to the coconut palm, the oil palm is the world's most profitable oil plant. The oil of the tropical crop is used in both the food and technical industries as well as for the production of bioenergy.
What is the oil palm and where does it come from?
The oil palm (Elaeis guineensis) is the world's most profitable oil plant and originally comes from West Africa. It grows to about 30 meters high and has deeply pinnate leaves, large inflorescences and drupes from which palm oil and palm kernel oil are extracted.
- Scientific name: Elaeis guineensis Jacq
- Order: Palmate
- Family: Palm trees
- Home: Tropical West Africa
- Main growing areas: South America, Indonesia, Malaysia
Appearance
The wild form of the oil palm grows to a height of around 30 meters and can live up to 200 years. Cultivated on plantations, the growth habit was changed through breeding so that the palm tree remains slightly smaller.
Tribe
As with many palm species, this only develops after a few years when the growth in thickness is complete. It is highly structured.
leaves
The deeply pinnate leaves grow up to seven meters long. They remain on the palm tree for about two years, then dry up and fall off. A clear scar remains at the base of the leaf, in which plant debris and airborne substances accumulate. What is typical for the oil palm is that epiphytes grow here.
Flowers
The oil palm forms large inflorescences from around the third year of life, consisting of a stable inflorescence axis with many side axes. The inflorescence bears either male or female flowers; mixed inflorescences are rarely found on young palms. Female flowers can be recognized by the thorny bracts, which remain even on the ripe fruit head.
Fruits
The stone fruits are ripe six to nine months after pollination. They are three to six centimeters long, two to four centimeters wide and weigh around twenty grams. The thinner outer shell surrounds the yellow to reddish, fibrous pulp, which consists of around 50 percent oil. This is only formed in the last month of ripening, which means that the initially hard fruits become soft. It is harvested when the first fruits separate from the fruit cluster because that is when the oil content is at its highest.
Depending on the size of the tree, this is done with long bamboo poles with a kind of sharp sickle attached to the end. The workers sometimes climb the palm trees and cut off the heavy fruit stalks with knives at dizzy heights. Palm oil is then extracted from the pulp and palm kernel oil is extracted from the palm seeds
Tip
Because it can be produced so cheaply, palm oil is now found in many of the products we use every day. Since the large oil plantations are not entirely uncontroversial for environmental reasons, it makes sense to only use products that contain certified palm oil.