ABSTRACT
This chapter provides information on uses, folk medicine, chemistry, germplasm, distribution, ecology, cultivation, harvesting, yields, energy, and biotic factors of Sugar Palm. Sugar palm is grown for its sugar, starch, and fiber. Sap contains 20 to 40% more sucrose than average sugarcane. Juice of the outer covering of fruit is highly corrosive and may cause pain and skin inflammation. Javanese use a root decoction for kidney stones. Fermented sap taken for tuberculosis in the Philippines and Indonesia; for sprue, dysentery, constipation, and hemorrhoids in Java. The felt-like tomentum at the leaf-base is used as a styptic. In forests of Indo-Malaysia, ripe fruits are distributed by various fruit bats, civet cats, and wild swine. Trees are only in semi-cultivation, mainly since trees require many years to begin to be useful. Sugar palm is virtually insect-, pest-, and disease-free, one fungus attacking the palm being Ganoderma pseudoferreum.
