cocos 



NUCIFERA 



Cocoanut 



" Oocotine.'' 



Future 

 Prospects. 



Superiority for 

 Baking. 



Independent 

 Position. 



Adulteration of 

 Volatile Oils. 



Poonac. 



Aattening 

 Property. 



Price. 



Total Traffic. 



Madras. 



THE COCOANUT PALM 



& Co. have commenced making what they call " Cocotine " at Pondicherry. 

 Similar factories have also been established in America and elsewhere. [Cf. 

 Madras Mail, Jan. 23, 1902 ; Ind. Agri., Nov. 1902, xxvii., 348 ; etc., etc.] 



There is thus an opening for Indian industries in this product which 

 that country will be ill advised to neglect. The importance to Europe of 

 the discoveries briefly indicated lies in the fact that cocoanut butter pro- 

 vides bakers and biscuit manufacturers with a substitute for butter which 

 is not only pure and cheap but even better suited for baking purposes than 

 butter proper. One of its chief advantages is that it does not readily 

 become rancid, and recently the use of this butter has been authorised for 

 culinary purposes in the French army, a fact significant of the future 

 demands of the world. The consumption of this product must in fact 

 } 7 early expand and the traffic become of infinite value. Confectioners are 

 said to find cocoanut butter an entirely satisfactory substitute for the more 

 expensive cacao butter (see p. 1076), the imports of which into England 

 have in consequence for some years past materially declined. Cocoanut 

 butter is not, however, strictly speaking, a substitute or even an 

 adulterant of dairy butter, but a substance that commands independent 

 recognition. [Cf. White and Humphrey, Pharmacop., 1901, 331 ; Revue 

 des Cult. Colon., June 1903, No. 126, 324.] 



Adulteration. It should be added that cocoanut oil is sometimes 

 used as an adulterant of volatile oils. It may be detected by the fact 

 that oils so adulterated will solidify wholly or in part in a freezing mixture. 

 Cocoanut oil has thus been found in cananga, citronella and palmarosa 

 oils. [Cf. Gildemeister and Hoffmann, Volatile Oils, 1900, 201.] Cocoa- 

 nut oil melts at 68 to 82 F. ; its sp. gr. at 212 F. is 0'868 to 0'874 and 

 its saponification from 209 to 228. 



Cocoanut Oilcake or Poonac. As observed above, this is the by- 

 product of copra, after the expression of the oil. Voelcker (Essay on the 

 Influence of Chem. Disc, on Agri. reviewed in Trop. Agrist., 1896, xv., 800) is 

 said to have observed that the cocoanut cake is better adapted for fattening 

 stock than for young growing animals or store-stock. Its analysis is 

 as follows : water 9*50 ; oil 8*43 ; albuminous bodies 30'40 (contain- 

 ing nitrogen 4' 50) ; mucilage, sugar, fibre, etc., 40'95 ; mineral matter 

 (ash) 10' 72. It was very largely taken up in Australia, after the establish- 

 ment of Messrs. Lever Brothers' Sydney Oilmills. In the Tropical Agri- 

 culturist (1898, xviii., 223) it is stated that cocoanut oilcake is not generally 

 used for milch-cows or other milking stock, or in Ceylon for horses ; but it 

 is the common food of working bulls, and is considered an excellent fattener 

 for pigs. 



Official statistics of the Indian trade in cocoanut cake are not available, 

 but according to a reply to a correspondent in Capital, Feb. 11, 1904, 

 the price in Ceylon was from Ks. 67 to Rs. 70 per ton, and from 12,000 

 to 15,000 tons were then -shipped annually from Colombo, mostly to 

 Germany and Belgium. The writer apparently did not consider it neces- 

 sary to take India into consideration. In fact he says Indian poonac 

 consists of rape-seed, castor-seed and gingelly (sesamum). Hanausek 

 (Micro. Tech. Prod. (Winton and Barber, transl.), 1907, 403-6) gives the 

 appearance of the cake under the microscope. The total exports of 

 Indian oilcake, it may be observed, amounted in 1903-4 to about 60,000 

 tons, of which Madras contributed 47,500 tons. The exports of oilcake 

 appear, however, under two headings (a) Cattle Food and (b) Manure. 



360 



