PALM WOOD PRODUCT AND DESIGN

Basically it is true to say that apart from a few exceptions (e.g. bentwood parts for furniture), all of the classical solid wood products can be processed from coconut palm wood. As with all other types of wood, it is necessary to take into account the fact that coconut palm wood must be dried down to a wood moisture content corresponding to the surrounding atmosphere (= a function of the prevailing air temperature and air humidity). For example this wood moisture content is about 8% for wood used in heated rooms. Such wood moisture content values are achieved only by kiln-drying of the kind described in Chapter 6.

A further criterion that must be taken into account when using coconut palm wood is its limited resistance to weathering. It is usable to only a limited extent for products in the outdoor area. In addition to design (structural) protection of the wood, chemical wood protection is indispensable when using palm wood out of doors.

The possibilities for using coconut palm wood will be demonstrated below with the aid of photographs from various areas of use.

Coconut wood has been successfully used to build houses of different standards (low-cost - Photos 2, 3 - as well as executive-type), for industrial and office construction as well as buildings for recreation (Photo 4) and worship (chapel) in Zamboanga and Davao, Philippines (Photo 5). In executive houses (Photo 6), e.g., all structural parts are made out of coconut wood. Where exposed to weathering, they have been treated before construction. The coconut wood framework is, on the inside, covered with tongued and grooved (t & g) coconut wood boards, the outside is covered with pressure-treated coconut wood panelling (Photo 7). Stairs and floors as well as door-and window frames (Photo 8) are made of high density coconut wood. The porches are ornamented with turned coconut wood balusters (Photo 9). Attractive furniture and accessories for offices, living-rooms and classrooms have been manufactured (Photos 10, 11,12,13, 14,15,16, 17). Tool handles of coconut wood are in use (Photo 18), as well as fence posts (Photo 19), house posts, transmission poles (Photos 20, 21) and crates (Photo 22).

Not feasible:

-   face veneer for plywood (coconut veneer sheets disintegrate during drying).

Technically feasible but uneconomical:

-   manufacture of pulp and paper

-   manufacture of chipboard and fibreboard (recovery too low due to high percentages of fines and high consumption of glue/resin).

Photo 2: Low-cost house

Photo 3: Handplaning of coconut beam for low-cost house construction

Sources FAO Report, Assessed on 21 February 2016

PRODUCT AND DESIGN

Defects in palm stems

Coconut palms are attacked by insects (rhinoceros beetle, palm weevil), mycoplasma-like organisms, and fungi.

Insects usually attack the growing point of the palm, reduce its vitality and finally lead to its death. Rhinoceros beetle attack can easily be detected visually. It results in palm fronds being cut in a diamond-shape.

Mycoplasma-like organisms attack the phloem and clog it. They result in the final death of palms. The diseases are known as Lethal Yellowing and Cadang-Cadang.

Fungi usually attack the palm stem, when its vitality is diminshed due to insects or mycoplasma-like organisms, or after physical damage, be it through hurricanes, or due to human impact. While the other two agents have no direct impact on the timber quality, fungal attack does. Most commonly fungi find entrance into the stem through harvesting steps cut into the outer, hard portion of the stem in some countries in order to facilitate harvesting of the nuts (Figure 4). Rainwater and dirt collects in the wounds, and fungi (and later also insects like termites) find their way into the stem and feed on the parenchymatic tissue. The attack appears as brown spots on a cross cut or as a string spot on a longitudinal cut, where the parenchyma is gone and only the bundles remain intact. This attack reduces both the properties as well as the appearance of the timber.

Products

Taking certain pre-conditions into account, almost the entire stem (trunk) of the coconut palm tree can be used to manufacture structural components, furniture and other utility articles.
The essential things that must be considered are:

-   density group and wood structure

-   the climate where it is to be used

-   the woodworking conditions.

The three density groups discussed in the first chapter must be taken as a basic pre-condition in utilization. A list of recommended uses is given in Table 3.

Table 3: End-uses for coconut wood

Use	Density group
	High	Medium	Low
Structural
- loadbearing	X
- studs, beams	X
- roof trusses	X	X
- gangnail trusses	X	X
- glulam beams	X	X
- floor joists	X	X
- internal members	X	X
Door and window frames	X	X
Staircases	X	X
Stairs	X
Flooring	X
Parquet	X
Wall-panelling (t & g)	X	X	X
In/outside cladding	X	X	X
Roof shingles	X	X
Furniture	X	X	(X)
Tool handles, tools	X
Kitchenware, bowls	X	X
Turned products	X	X
Curios	X	X
Crates, pallets, boxes	X	X	X
Charcoal	X	X
Briquettes			X
Transmission poles	round, hollow stem
Fence posts	quarter split, upper third of stem

As can be seen in Table 3, wooden products are manufactured mainly from medium-density and high-density coconut palm wood. The low-density wood does not achieve adequate strength values and surface qualities and therefore has only a very limited range of uses.

Sources FAO Report, Assessed on 21 February 2016

COCONUT PALM STEM

Cross section of coconut palm stem with density zones

Source:Sulc, 1984, 1

Only when palms are over 60 years of age (that is, when the copra yield declines, and they are of less interest to the farmer), is enough “wood” built up and therefore of use to the sawmiller. This implies that there is no conflict between the use of the palm for its primary production (oil and fat) and the later stem use for timber. On the contrary: the use of the timber generates a windfall profit to the farmer.

It also implies that only stems of tall varieties can be used for timber, not those of dwarf varieties.
The percentage of the various density groups per stem depends on variety, site, age, sweep of palm, human impact (harvesting step, Figure 4), and the extent of fungus and insect damage.

Harvesting steps in coconut palm stem

With 80-year-old palms of the San Ramon Tall variety in Zamboanga a distribution of

High density	40 – 50 %
Medium density	20 – 30 %
Low density	20 – 30 %

was observed.

All mechanical properties which define the use of a timber are closely related to its density (weight/volume at given moisture content). This inhomogeneity influences the methods of processing as well as the uses for the coconut palm stem. Sulc (1983, 3) has assessed the mechanical properties for the different density groups (Table 2) of 80-year-old coconut palm stems from Mindanao, Philippines.

Table 2: Mechanical properties of coconut wood, 12 % mc

Basic density	(g/cm3)	0.25 – 0.39	0.4 – 0.59	>0.6
Strength	(MPa)
Modulus of elasticity		3633	7116	11414
Modulus of rupture		33	63	104
Compression parallel to grain		19	38	57
Shear		n.a.	8	13

Source: Sulc, 1983, 3

Sources FAO Report, Assessed on 21 February 2016

USE OF THE COCONUT PALM STEM

Source: Jensen and Killmann, 1981
Depending on its oven-dry density, coconut wood can be segregated into three different groups (Figure 3):

High density timber (HD)
(> 0.6 g/cm³)
Timber from lower periphery of stem. Can be used for load-bearing structural purposes, framing, flooring, staircases, tool handles, furniture.

Medium density timber (MD)
(0.4 – 0.59 g/cm³)
Timber from upper stem periphery and lower middle section. Used for limited load-bearing structural purposes, furniture, wall-panelling, curios.

Low density timber (LD)
(< 0.4 g/cm³ )
Timber from core sections. Indoor use only, where no load is applied, e.g. wall-panelling.

Fig. 3: Cross section of coconut palm stem with density zones

Source:Sulc, 1984, 1

Only when palms are over 60 years of age (that is, when the copra yield declines, and they are of less interest to the farmer), is enough “wood” built up and therefore of use to the sawmiller. This implies that there is no conflict between the use of the palm for its primary production (oil and fat) and the later stem use for timber. On the contrary: the use of the timber generates a windfall profit to the farmer.
It also implies that only stems of tall varieties can be used for timber, not those of dwarf varieties.
The percentage of the various density groups per stem depends on variety, site, age, sweep of palm, human impact (harvesting step, Figure 4), and the extent of fungus and insect damage.
Sources FAO Report, Assessed on 21 February 2016

THE SOURCE OF COCONUT PALM

Cocos nucifera L, the coconut palm, is an agricultural crop widely spread throughout the tropics. It has been cultivated by man for 4000 years. The main produce is copra, the dried kernel of the nut. Converted into oil, it becomes the base for a wide range of products, from cooking oil to soap and shoe polish.

Traditionally, coconut palms were found around hamlets in the tropics, in rather small stands to provide the villagers with basics such as:

-   vegetable fat (from copra)

-   roofing material (leaves)

-   ropes and strings (coir from the husks)

-   beverage (coconut juice)

-   alcoholic drink (from the inflorescence - tuba or toddy)

-   fuel (from the husks and nuts)

-   timber (from the stem).

At the end of the last century, coconut palms were planted in larger plantations, especially in the Pacific and on the Philippines, Ceylon, East Africa and the Caribbean, for large-scale copra production. Presently, more than 10 million ha are worldwide under coconut palms. According to stem height, tall and dwarf varieties are distinguished. 45 tall and 18 dwarf varieties are known. All older plantations are planted with tall varieties. Once these palms are 50 – 60 years old the copra yield declines rapidly. When the plantation-grown palms reached this age in the 1960s, replanting programmes were developed and the question of economic removal and disposal of old palms arose.
Removal was necessary in order to make space for new plantations. If the material was left to rot, the rhinoceros beetle (Oryctes rhinoceros) would start to breed in the decaying material and attack the young seedlings. Subsequently, various coconut-growing countries started to investigate the economic disposal or use of the stem. The research activities started were partly funded and backed by the governments of New Zealand and the Philippines, as well as by the FAO (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations). In Zamboanga, Philip-pines, a research station was established and the utilization of the coconut palm stem as a timber resource was assessed and proven.

Properties of the palm stem
Although inappropriate, the term “coconut wood” has been established for the material of the coconut palm stem, and will therefore be used in this handbook as well. Unlike “conventional” trees, palms, like many other monocotyledons, have vascular fibre bundles (red-brown spots on a cross-section) scattered in a yellowish parenchymatic ground tissue. These bundles contain the water and nutrient transport system (xylem vessels and phloem) as well as thick-walled fibres giving the stem its strength, and paratracheal parenchymatic cells. The ground parenchyma has mainly a storage function and contains starch among other things. The anatomical features result in a rather non-homogenous distribution of physical properties both over cross-section and height, and thus in a very non-homogenous raw material. Principally, the density decreases towards the centre of the stem, and over stem height. Figure 1 gives a qualitative impression of the density distribution over the stem from five 80-year-old Philippine palms, Photo 1 shows its distribution (dark = high density) over a cross section.

Fig. 1: Schematic density distribution in mature coconut palm stem

Source: Killmann, 1983

Sources FAO Report, Assessed on  21 February 2016

COCONUT WOOD

Coconut timber is a hardwood-substitute from coconut palm trees. It is a new timber resource that comes from plantation crops and offers an alternative to rainforest timber. 


Coconut timber comes from farmed plantations of old coconut palms. The coconut palm was planted as a crop in large plantations throughout the tropics in the early half of the 20th century in order to harvest the coconut fruit. The tree bears fruit until approximately 70 years of age, at which point it is considered to have reached the end of its economic life and is felled to make way for future crops. Each year, several million palms are felled throughout the tropics. Traditionally, the trunks have been wasted by-products from this process.

Only in very recent years have people begun to explore the potential commercial uses for this vast, alternative supply of timber. This led to the commercial launch of coconut timber in a range of different products, from flooring to posts to furniture. With these products performing at equal to or even better than conventional hardwoods, coconut timber represents a viable substitute for endangered hardwoods from an ecologically-sound source.

Coconut timber has many applications as both a structural and interior design material. The harder, high-density timber is suitable for general structural purposes such as pillars, trusses, rafting, furniture, window and door frames, floors, decking and floor joists. Medium density coconut timber can be used for walls, ceiling joists and horizontal studs. Low density coconut timber is used in non-load bearing applications like wood paneling, internal trim and ceilings, as well as homewares.”

                                                    Coconut wood furniture

Coconut wood flooring

Wooden coffee and tea cups made out of coconut wood

www.naturalbuildingblog.com

VIRGIN COCONUT OIL BENEFITS - POWER FOOD HEALTH AND HAIR CARE

Although there is no standardized definition of virgin coconut oil, several companies are labeling, "virgin coconut oil" on their products. Even from the ancient times, coconut oil has been used extensively in many countries. It is considered to be very healthy, because it is obtained from the natural source.

Constituents:

It is considered to be beneficial for health despite its high saturated fat content. Researches reveal that saturated oil in virgin coconut oil is not the same as in other oils. It contains some healthy compounds like caprylic acid, capric acid and lauric acid.

In this post we will look into some of the virgin coconut oil benefits:

Strengthens Immune System - If you are battling with any viral and fungal infection, them you can start using virgin coconut oil in our food preparations. The saturated fatty acid in it has antiviral, antifungal, and antibacterial properties, which help in strengthening your immune system.

Preventing cardiovascular Disease - Using coconut oil for cooking is beneficial for health. Despite having high amount of saturated fatty acids, virgin coconut oil reduces the risk of heart attack, high cholesterol, and high blood pressure. Lauric acid present in coconut oil reduces the chances of injuries in arteries. Hence it helps in preventing arthrosclerosis.

Stimulation of thyroid glands - Thyroid is a common disease affecting many people. One of the biggest virgin coconut oil benefits is that it has the characteristics to improve or reverse hypothyroidism up to the level that the medication can be slowed down and eventually stopped.

Weight Loss - Women who used coconut oil regularly noticed a significant reduction in their abdominal weight. It increases the rate of metabolism, where the body uses it for converting into energy, rather than storing it as fat.

Skincare - It acts an effective moisturizer for all type of skin, and does not give any side effects. It protects infected body parts by forming an antibacterial layer. It is used as a basic ingredient in various body and hair care products like soap, lotions, cream etc. It is helpful in healing skin problems like rashes, dermatitis, spots, wrinkles, and eczema.

Overcoming digestive problems - Use of coconut oil in cooking helps you in overcoming various digestion related issues. Saturated fats of coconut oil have antimicrobial properties, which help in dealing with various bacterial and parasitical diseases. It helps in absorption of food nutrients like vitamins, minerals and amino acids.

Prevents osteoporosis - Daily oil massage will help you in getting pain relief. It is also known to increase the calcium level in your body.

Fighting Infection - Due to its antifungal, antiviral, and antibacterial properties, it kills disease causing agents of influenza, measles hepatitis, pneumonia and gonorrhea.

Enriches milk supply in breastfeeding mothers - Daily consumption of 3 to 4 tablespoons of coconut oil is recommended for breast feeding moms, as it enriches the milk supply.

Preventing kidney disorders - It is also known to prevent kidney and gall bladder diseases. It helps in dissolving kidney stones.

Insulin management - Virgin coconut oil controls blood sugar, which in turn improves insulin secretion. It promotes effective utilization of blood glucose, and therefore it is used for preventing and treating diabetes.

Dental Care - It helps in maintaining strong teeth by facilitating the absorption of calcium from our body, as calcium is the main element of our teeth. It also prevents tooth decay.

Eliminating stretch marks - If you have been operated and have stretch marks on your body, then massaging with coconut oil can help in reducing their appearance.

Conclusion

Virgin coconut oil is obtained from fresh coconut meat, and the process involves quick drying and wet melting. The virgin coconut oil benefits have given a big boost of its demand in the world market.

You can look into some indicators to check its purity. If it is pure it would remain in a liquid state at room temperature. It solidifies at temperatures lower than its melting point. It is widely used in tropical countries like India, Sri Lanka, Thailand, the Philippines, etc. Coconut oil is being manufactured in abundance in those areas.

- www.coconut-info.net

Coconut Oil Benefits and Properties

The coconut along with its products is widely famous for a range of health benefits. Coconut oil does not make an exception. This oil is a nutritious oil obtained from the flesh of ripe coconuts. Coconut oil is utilized worldwide not only in food, but in industrial and cosmetic purposes.

The oil is rather popular due to its various useful qualities. It can resist heat, high temperatures during cooking and rancidification. The range of coconut oil benefits is staggering. Though coconut oil contains highly saturated fat, it does not, in fact, do any harm, and on the contrary is one of the healthiest oils. Its healthy properties favor many aspects: weight loss, taking care of your teeth, hair and skin, speeding up metabolism, alleviating kidney problems, heart issues, improving digestion, boosting immune system, strengthening bones, and even fighting off such serious illnesses like cancer, HIV, diabetes. Coconut oil contains a variety of acids, including lauric, capric and caprylic acids. Coconut oil is also a strong antimicrobial, antibacterial, antiviral and antifungal agent.

Taking hair care, using coconut oil may have a favorable effect. Oil of the coconut provides nutrition for your hair. It is instrumental in growing hair and making them healthy and shiny. Applying coconut oil on your hair every day provides damaged hair with nutrients, helps hair grow better. Coconut oil applications also can keep your hair from dandruff and lice.

Applying oil on the skin has an incredible effect as well. Using it daily, your skin will eventually become soft, sleek and smooth. Coconut oil can be used for all types of skin. It moisturizes it, softens it, prevents skin ageing and sagging, smoothes out wrinkles. Moreover, coconut oil does not cause any side effects. The oil is also used in treating various skin problems and infections like dermatitis, eczemas. Due to its antioxidant properties it also aids in preventing precocious skin ageing.

Thus, coconut oil is often utilized in cosmetic industry, manufacturing different shampoos, creams, lotions and conditioners.

Using coconut oil is known to be efficacious in treating heart conditions. Due to high levels of the lauric acid and saturated fat, it can be beneficial for heart issues. It is helpful in keeping your cholesterol level and blood pressure in balance, reducing the incidence of diseases.

For those struggling with weight issues, coconut oil is a wonderful way to help you out. It speeds up metabolism in the organism, favors digestion processes, normalizes the thyroid gland functioning, helps burn extra calories. Coconut oil helps in preventing digestive disorders, bowel issues and other stomach problems. Coconut oil kills various fungi bacteria that cause digestion problems.

Coconut oil is beneficial in improving your immunity. Due to the abovementioned content of lauric and capric acids, which possess antiviral qualities, coconut oil strengthens your body resistance abilities to various bacteria. It also helps fight off diseases, infections and other ailments including herpes, hepatitis, measles, pneumonia, gonorrhea. The oil is effective in accelerating wound healing activity and soothing pain. It rapidly repairs affected tissues. That is why it is recommended to apply oil coconut onto the bruises.

Improving the release of insulin and controlling the level of sugar in the blood, the oil is effective in treating diabetes. Illnesses of urinary tract can also be treated with coconut oil.

If you are experiencing a stressful situation, the oil of the coconut can contribute to soothing stress. Applying the oil onto your head and massaging it brings considerable relaxation. It is especially effective after hard mental work. Due to its anti-inflammatory properties, the oil alleviates joint and muscle tension, reduces inflammation.

- www.coconut-info.net

Coconut Oil - The Miracle Oil That You Can Include In Your Health Regimes

Coconut oil is used extensively in most parts of the world and is applied topically on the skin and hair. However, most of us do not know that this incredible oil has many health benefits too. When used in cooking, it can be treated as a health tonic with the potential of curing some serious diseases.

Adding coconut oil in cooking

Using virgin coconut oil in organic form for cooking can be one of the wisest choices. When the natural oil is hydrogenated, it changes into a chemical form and thus turns into trans-fat. Trans-fat is extremely unhealthy and can also lead to heart diseases.

However, virgin coconut oil comes in the form of unprocessed, hydrogenated or refined form and contains saturated fat, which is good for your health. It is important to understand that though virgin coconut oil contains 90% of saturated fat, it is actually medium chain fatty acids (MCFA) that is beneficial and can improve your health in various ways.

MCFA is digestible and also burns off easily. This is in contrast to most of the oil we use and eat everyday, which are made of LCFA or long chain fatty acids. LCFA cannot break easily and thus finally ends up accumulating as fat in our bodies.

Health benefits

The presence of caprylic acid, lauric acid, and capric acid attributes to the health benefits provided by coconut oil. These make coconut oil complete with antioxidant, antimicrobial, antibacterial, antifungal and soothing properties. I allows for enhanced metabolism and proper digestion. It also helps in getting relief from dental problems and provides bone strength.

Some of the coconut diseases cures are:

- Heart diseases
- Hypothyroidism
- Problems related to kidneys
- Controlling Diabetes
- Balancing high blood pressure
- Alzheimer`s disease

disease

Coconut oil is highly beneficial in reducing weight as well. The MCFA present in it is easily digestible and hence, allows good functioning of enzymes and thyroid systems. It also increases body metabolism, removes stress, which burns energy and helps people to lose weight. 

The presence of lauric acid in coconut oil helps in prevention of many heart related problems. Intake of this oil:

- Reduces high blood pressure
- High levels of cholesterol
- No increase in the LDL levels
- Reduces injury in the arteries
- Prevents atherosclerosis

Enhances digestion and immune system

Coconut oil when used in cooking can help in the coconut diseases treatment by improving digestion and developing a better immunity system in the body. Apart from keeping your skin healthy and glowing, it also treats various stomach and digestive problems like irritable bowel issues. 

The saturated or good fat (MCFA) in coconut oil has many anti-microbial properties that help in treating different fungi, bacteria and parasites, which are responsible for indigestion. The lauric acid of this oil is converted as monolaurin in our body, which deals with bacteria and viruses causing diseases like:

- Herpes
- Cytomegalovirus
- Influenza
- HIV

Harmful bacteria like helibacter pylori, listeria monocytogenes and harmful protozoa like giardia lamblia are eliminated with the intake of coconut oil.

Alzheimer`s disease

Coconut diseases therapy is also quite popular. The oil is said to help with Alzheimer`s disease, which is an age-related ailment. It has high levels of antioxidants that prevent weakening of brain cells leading to dementia and Alzheimer`s disease.

The polyphenols existing in coconut oil soak up the free radicals that allow the cells to carry out its function effectively. Cell generation accelerates, which help in replacing the old cells with new and healthy ones. As a result, the brain can also operate in a much better way.

The list of benefits can go on and it has earned the title of "miracle oil" due to the wonderful treatments and the effects that the coconut oil provides us. You take it topically or in food, it surely gives you amazing benefits to make you feel young and healthy.

- www.coconut-info.net

INTRODUCTION OF COCONUT PALM

The coconut palm (Cocos nucifera, L.) has multifarious uses. It is often described as a tree of life and is one of the most important crops in the tropics. It is also considered as one of the world's most beautiful trees. Practically all parts of the coconut can be manufactured into commercial products. The coconut provides food, shelter and fuel especially in countries in Asia and the Pacific where it is abundantly grown.

Unlike the many uses of the coconut fruits and the leaves, it is perhaps not very well known that the coconut stem is equally useful. Annex 1 gives some characteristics of the tree and its wood relevant to utilization. The possibility of utilizing the coconut palm wood on a commercial scale has been recognized only in the last decade or so, although usage of wood from palm species has been known by people in the villages since time immemorial. In more recent times, coconut palm wood has been successfully utilized in a number of coconut growing countries such as the Philippines, Indonesia, Sri Lanka, Fiji, the Tonga Islands and many others.

It has been used in boat making in many islands in the Pacific. Relatively large and elaborate church structures and roof components have been constructed early in this century from round or hewn coconut palm wood, and these materials are reported to be still in good condition. These roof structures have been reported to have survived many tropical high wind storms including the hurricane "Isaac" (Tonga Islands) in 1982 which was responsible for considerable damage to many contemporary buildings.

As a result of the heavy reliance on utilization of traditional wood species without adequate provision for resource renewal, the wood-using industry now faces scarcity and prohibitive cost of conventional wood. The need to look for lesser-known indigenous wood material that can be used as a good substitute for commercially-known wood species to overcome the inadequate supply of logs and at the same time help conserve the remaining forests led to a serious consideration of the many uses of the coconut trunk.

The growing number of old and senile palms in coconut growing countries especially in Asia and the Pacific necessities large-scale replanting. In some countries, the occurrence of strong hurricanes usually fells thousands if not millions of coconut trees on a yearly basis. Still in other countries, the move towards urbanization or coconut plantations being transformed into residential areas requires the cutting of coconut trees and thus, necessitates efficient utilization of the trunks².

2When old palms are felled, proper disposal of the trunks should be done. Otherwise, if they are allowed to rot in the field, they would serve as breeding places for beetles which would ultimately create serious infestation problems to the newly - established coconut palms.

It has been widely recognized that the most effective way of disposing the felled trunks is to convert them to saleable wood products which not only provides a system of proper disposal but can generate employment and give an additional source of income in coconut producing countries. Furthermore, coconut wood utilization can supplement the supply of raw materials for the wood industry and provide low-cost but equally durable construction materials for the housing programmes in these countries and for export.

Cognizant of the value of the coconut trunk as a wood resource with various applications, efficient coconut wood utilization technologies have been developed by a number of research institutes in Asia and the Pacific. The main purpose of this paper is to make an assessment of the existing and potential resources of coconut wood in the Asia-Pacific region with focus not only on resource availability trends but also on the technologies and facilities that are available for efficient coconut wood utilization and the driving forces that affect them. The paper will also describe and analyse the current situation as well as the prospects of utilization and marketing of cocowood products in the region highlighting on the value that could be added by processing coconut wood and the actual as well as the potential financial and social impact such operations could bring to the region.

Sources FAO Report, Assessed on 21 February 2016