Utilaization of Coconut Palm Wood
 The coconut palm has multiple uses. It's often called as a tree of life and is one of the most valuable crops in the tropics. It's also considered as one of the most beatiful trees in the world. Practically every part of the coconut can be made into commercial products. The coconut provides food, shelter and fuel in countries in Asia and the Pacific where it is richly grown.
It is probably not very well known that the coconut is equivalently useful as many uses of the coconut fruits and the leaves. Utilization of the wood from palm species has been well known by the people of the villages since old times, but the possibility of using the coconut pal wood on a commercial scale has just been recognized only in the past decade or so. In recent years, coconut palm wood has been successfully used in many of the coconut growing countries such as Indonesia, Sri Lanka, Fiji, the Tonga Island and a number of others.
Coconut Palm wood has been utilized in boat making in a number of islands in the
Pacific. Comparatively large and intricate church structures and its roof components were constructed early in this century from round or cutoff coconut palm wood and those structures are reported to be still in good shape. It is also reported that those structures have survived quite a few tropical wind storms including the Hurricane "Isaac" (Tonga Islands) in 1982 which was the cause of considerable damages on many contemporary buildings.
The wood industry currently faces scarcity and prohibitive cost of conventional
wood as a result of the heavy reliance on utilization of traditional wood species
without adequate provision for resource renewal.
It is essential to closely look at the fact that the coconut palm wood is not known
as an indigenous wood material that can be utilized 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 forest led to a serious
consideration of the many uses of the coconut trunk.
The increasing number of old and senile pal in the coconut growing countries in
Asia and the Pacific needs 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 trunks.
When 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
programmers in these countries and for export.
Recognizant 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 the researches is to an assessment of the existing
and potential resources of coconut wood in the Asia and 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
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