crop is hand shelled by the workers of these firms 
and the kernels exported in tins. The remainder 
of the export crop is shipped as whole nuts. 
Cashew nuts come from the small tree caji 
which is widely distributed over the dry sections of 
Brazil. The harvest from wild and cultivated trees 
rose from about 2,000 metric tons in 1955 to 9,670 
in 1961 (table 15). Both the fleshy part of the fruit 
and the nut are foods. and the hard shells of the 
kernels are a source of cardol, an oil used largely for 
electrical insulation. 
Waxes 
The world’s hardest wax is produced from the 
carnauba palm (fig. 28) and in lesser amounts from 
the licuri or ouricuri palm (Syagrus coronata). 
Both palms grow in the alternating dry and wet 
climate in the Northeast Region and western Bahia. 
From 1955 to 1961, annual output of carnauba wax 
increased from 5,600 to 11,445 metric tons, while 
that of licuri wax decreased from 510 to 157 tons 
(table 15). The number of carnauba palms in pro- 
duction is estimated at 80 million. The wax is 
threshed from the surface of the mature leaves. 
Each tree produces an average of 414% ounces of wax 
per year, the yield being heaviest in extreme drought 
years. Licuri wax is more difficult to remove, it 
must be scraped from the surface of the leaves, and 
is therefore more expensive to collect than carnauba 
wax. Almost the total wax output is exported, 
mainly to the United States. 
Fibers 
Piassava palms (Attalea funifera) furnish a tough 
fiber used for brushes and brooms, and _ fibers of 
tucum, a name applied to several species of the palm 
(Photo by K. Hueck, courtesy IFLA.) 
Figure 28.—Carnauba palms in northeastern Brazil. 
32 FOREST RESOURCE REPORT 16, U.S. 
DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 
