Palm oil from the fruit of the palm is physically and chemically different from either palm kernel oil which is derived from the seed, and from coconut oil, both of which are highly saturated.

Palm oil and its liquid fraction, palm olein, are consumed worldwide as cooking oils and as constituents of margarines and shortenings; these oils are also incorporated into fat blends used in the manufacture of a variety of food products as well as in home food preparation.

Like other common edible fats and oils, palm oil is easily digested, absorbed and utilized in normal metabolic processes. It plays a useful role in meeting energy and essential fatty acid needs. Palm oil, like other vegetable oils, is cholestrol free. Having a moderate level of saturation, it does not require hydrogenation for use as a fat component in foods and , as such, does not contain trans fatty acids.

Palm oil, unlike other oils, is composed of 44% palmitic acid. Palmitic acid is a saturated fatty acid, and is now found to be less hypercholesterolemic than saturated fatty acids. In addition, palm oil is much less saturated than other oils, such as coconut and palm kernel oil because palm oil contains roughly equal amounts of saturated and unsaturated fatty acids. It can be considered to be a balanced fat.

Palm oil and palm oil products are naturally occuring sources of the antioxidant vitamin E constituents, tocopherols and tocotrienols. These natural antioxidants act as scavengers of damaging oxygen free radicals and are hypothesized to play a protective role in cellular aging, atherosclerosis and cancer.

The oil palm is a native of West Africa, where wild palms are still harvested and the oil obtained by simple traditional methods in the village. It has a long history of food use, with archaeological evidence going back 5,000 years. However, improved varieties have been planted widely in the wet tropics in Africa, Latin America and South East Asia. The palm fruit grows in large bunches containing up to 2,000 individual fruits. Palm oil is obtained from the flesh surrounding the seed, simply by cooking, mashing and pressing. In this process, the seeds are separated and after cracking and removing the shell, the kernel can be processed to yield palm kernel oil. This forms about 10% of the total oil yield and is always kept separate, as its composition and uses are quite different. The oil palm is the world's most productive oil producing plant.

In West Africa, palm oil is often still consumed in the crude state, as a component of traditional foods, where it contributes its characteristic colour and flavour to the dishes. However to most users, palm oil is familiar as a fully refined product. It is processed in two stages, firstly in the oil mill, which produces crude palm oil from the fruit and secondly in the refinery, which produces a neutral, near white oil by removing free fatty acids, colour and unwanted flavour.

Uses

• Vegetable oils are used to replace milk fat in dairy products such as milk and icecream. Countries that have to import part of their milk supplies find it most economical to import skimmed milk powder or sodium caseinate and reconstitute it with vegetable oil. These products usually have better keeping properties than those containing butterfat.
• Palm oil is also used in coffee whiteners or coffee creamers.
• Cheese - It is desirable to use a fat blend containing some short chain fatty acids, similar to butterfat, because part of the final characteristic flavour of cheese is developed from these components. A blend of 50% palm oil, 40% palm kernel oil or coconut oil and 10% rapeseed or soyabean oil is used.
• Peanut butter - In order to prevent oil separation during storage, it is necessary to add a stabiliser. A palm stearin is widely used.
• Salad dressings - maintains good colour and aroma and extends the shelf life once opened to 30 days.
• Palm oil is used as a minor ingredient in bread. The addition of about 2% to the dough during mixing keeps the loaf soft.
• Vanaspati was originally developed in the 1930s in India as an alternative to the traditional butter fat ghee. Similar products are now customary throughout the Indian subcontinent and in most Arab countries. Originally made from hydrogenated groundnut oil, vanaspati formulae are now based on a variety of indigenous and imported vegetable oils such as palm oil.
• It is used domestically, in restaurants, fast food outlets and in large scale preparation of fried potato products and other snack foods in large scale food manufacture. In the East, a comparable use is in the preparation of instant noodles. This practice started in Japan, using palm oil to replace animal fats, and is now common also in South Korea and China.
• Bakery shortenings - The results obtained from palm based fats are indistinguishable in volume and also in respect of texture and crumb structure. They provide a smooth consistency and is essential in cake making and creaming applications.

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Red Palm Olein

This new product from palm oil has recently become avaiable. Red palm olein is refined by specially mild process so as to retain most of the natural carotenes. The carotenes are nutritionally valuable substances, as precursors of properties in the body. The red palm olein is recommended for curry dishes, satay sauce and the frying of potato chips. Its use in margerine blends provides a natural source of colouring, which is also useful in some cake shortenings. Red palm olein is not advised for repeated deep pan frying because the carotenes are broken down and their benefit is then lost.

 

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The Palm Oil Industry in Nigeria

Palm oil is produced mainly in the southern part of the country because of natural vegetation that is favourable to the growth of palm trees.

Over 90 percent of the palm oil in Nigeria is from the wild palms which are found in groves in most parts of the country. Industrial use of palm oil has become very significant in Nigeria. Palm oil export from Nigeria declined drastically as soon as crude oil was discovered in commercial quantity in Nigeria.

Palm oil output in Nigeria has had a very bad growth record in the past decade. The poor growth rate of output is due largely to the increasing average age of palm trees, and hence, the declining yield of those trees. The poor performance is also reflected in Nigeria's share of world palm output which declined from about 36 percent in 1965 to about 27 percent in 1982 during oil boom era.

Palm oil export from Nigeria has fared even worse. The sharp decline in export stems from a rapidly expanding domestic demand for oil, which was not matched by output expansion. Similarly, palm kernel, which is a product of the palm tree, did not also boost foreign exchange earning of the country. Like palm oil, palm kernel production remained virtually stagnant between 1960 and 1972 except for the sharp decline that occurred between 1967 and 1969 due to the civil war.

Nigeria's share of total world palm kernel output decline from about 41 percent in 1965 to 32 percent in 1972. Export declined rather sharply from 418 thousand Metric tons in 1960 to about 181 thousand metric tones in 1974. The decline is largely accounted for by a rapidly domestic demand particularly for industrial processing. This is why the proportion of palm kernel output exported decline from 97 percent in 1960 to 91 percent in 1965 and 50 percent in 1972. Throughout the period of oil boom, income from palm kernel was marked by sharp annual fluctuations. This was more so for export income than product income as producer prices fluctuated less than export prices.

The shortages and attendant high prices of oil palm and other traditional products also reflect the inadequacies in the efforts of the government, private individuals and cooperative organisations to substantially expand the nation's food supply base to meet the heavy demand arising from our rapidly growing population, raw materials for our industries as well as exports.

When one reflects on the days the defunct Eastern region was mainly known for its God given natural endowment, which amongst others are Coal, oil palm and coconuts before the discovery of crude oil in commercial qualities, it becomes obvious to conclude that our leaders have not managed our naturally endowed resources well. It is unfortunate that our previous governments allowed this oil palm glory of ours to be lost.

The Oil Palm tree is one of the greatest economic assets a state or nation has, provided its importance is realized and potentials fully harnessed. The Oil Palm products include Palm Oil, Palm Kernel Oil and Palm Kernel Cake. These can further be processed into RBD OLEIN (Cooking Oil), Vegetable Ghee, Shortenings, Margarine, CBS. CBE, Ice Cream, Dough, Creaming, Coating, and other speciality fats. Some other by-products of the Oil Palm includes Palm wine, fatty alcohols as well as intermediates. Nature so made it that all aspects of the Oil palm tree is useful and economically viable.

Malaysia, which is the leader in oil palm business in the world today, got its first seedlings from Nigeria. Having discovered the potential quite early, Malaysia took the cultivation very seriously in an effort to boost its economy. In Malaysia, it is called "the golden crop". It is the cornerstone of the country's industrial growth today.

Malaysia, driven by the desire to remain on top, has over 3.2 million hectares of oil palm plantations, milling out nine million tons of palm oil with earnings up to $7 billion from its export. Presently, Malaysia has gone beyond fabrication of mills to the addition of value to the products by refining and fractionating oil in order to produce chemicals like the fatty acids, fatty alcohols and intermediates.

It was in an attempt to restore the oil palm to its prime position as well as agriculture as the mainstay of the economy that the federal and state governments started revamping and establishing oil palm agencies. For example, states like Anambra, Abia, Cross River, and Rivers States established oil palm agencies while the federal government increased its funding to the Nigerian Institute of Oil Research (NIFOR) Benin. Anambra State Oil Palm Development Agency, established in 1989 by the Robert Akonobi Administration in the old Anambra State, was charged to execute the small holder oil palm development scheme of the state government as well as Oil Palm plantations, nurseries and Oil Mills amongst others.

Similarly, the oil palm development effort of other states has received priority attention. Specifically, the Anambra oil palm development agency was charged to execute the small holder oil palm development scheme of the state as well as to establish and expand oil palm produces among others.

Like many government's policies that are beautiful on paper but leave much to be desired in the implementation, the agency has wound up and the assets/ liabilities inherited by the State Ministry of Agriculture shortly after the creation of Anambra state in 1992. The State governor, Dr. Chinwoke Mbadinuju, in realisation of the importance of the agency in the state's economic recovery effort reconstituted an 11 man board of the agency.

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