Towards the Sustainability of the “Tree of Life”: An Introduction

Abstract

It has been estimated that around one in ten of the human population is connected directly with coconut production and the processing, trade, and retail distribution of the diversity of its products. Industry planners, nationally and internationally, require information on the principal sources of production, and consumption, locally and through world trade, as well as awareness of the urgency for replanting and the potential means to rapidly achieve this. The production base of the coconut industry is shown to be currently stable, but the advanced age of a high proportion of the palms foreshadows an accelerating decline in productivity unless renewal begins immediately. The purpose of this book is to provide a road map for replanting by identifying up-to-date knowledge on the ecology of the coconut, its management needs, and above all the choice of genotypes possessing traits that will advance adaptation and potential productivity beyond that presently achieved by the old generation of palms needing to be replaced. Recent advances in biotechnology, offering the possibility for a new way to conserve germplasm by cryopreservation, the large-scale cloning of coconut, and the detailed understanding of coconut genetics, are shown here. Taken together, they present a great opportunity to deliver superior plantlets and seedlings in an adequate quantity to specific regions. The complexities and challenges of selecting the best possible genotype for a given location are shown to be a pressing need requiring urgent attention.