Pacific has the biggest coconut in the world

Emil Adams




Do you know what the biggest coconut in the world is?
It is the niu kafa, found only in the Pacific Islands (in Melanesia and Polynesia).
The biggest coconut on record is from Samoa, at 50 centimetres. The niu kafa and other traditional coconuts are threatened with extinction, and a conservation effort is now underway to preserve these culturally significant coconut varieties and their diverse fruits including the unique niu kafa. 
The conservation drive for the niu kafa is also part of the celebration that recognises 2010 as the UN-declared international year of biodiversity.  (http://www.cbd.int/2010/welcome/).
Traditional coconut varieties are being threatened with extinction owing to past efforts by national governments to promote the planting of high-yielding hybrid coconuts which yield larger volumes of dried copra.
The niu kafa coconut has a thick husk with long fibres. Niu kafa is called niu ni magimagi in Fiji and niu kafa in Tonga and niu afa Samoa. Generally, coconut palms fall into two varieties: ‘green tall’ and ‘red dwarf’.
Niu kafa belongs to the green tall variety, which is characterised by a large, long but relatively narrow fruit. This variety is prized for making sennet (afa), which is still in use today as a strong twine and rope for constructing traditional fales and canoes. Niu kafa is also becoming increasingly used in traditional island handicrafts.
A preliminary survey of niu afa coconut palms in Samoa was conducted in March by Dr Roland Bourdeix, senior researcher with the French scientific organisation CIRAD, with assistance from Valerie S. Tuia, SPC curator based at the Centre for Pacific Crops and Trees (CePaCT).
Dr Bourdeix is passionate about coconuts and is on a mission to conserve traditional coconut germplasm in the Pacific. He recently presented the findings of the Samoa niu afa coconut survey in a seminar held at the University of the South Pacific (USP) in Suva.
The seminar was jointly hosted by SPC’s Land Resources Division and USP’s School of Natural Resources. The survey itself was co-funded by Global Diversity Trust and SPC’s Land Resources Division. Research officers from Samoa’s Nuu Crop Development Centre  assisted the survey team.
According to Dr Bourdeix, Samoa has the purest form of niu kafa, and all the coconuts are homogenous green in colour. The niu kafa survey found this coconut palm faces extinction with less than 30 palms identified as pure niu afa from farmers’ fields. Most niu kafa plants were found growing as isolated individuals near homes and along the roadside, but never in coconut plantations.
Samoa’s Ministry of Agriculture has a coconut seed garden at Olomanu, a few kilometres inland from the international airport at Faleolo.
The Olomanu coconut seed garden operated in the mid-1970s as the national research station for hybrid coconuts as well as a genebank for conservation of traditional varieties.
Niu afa is one of these coconut varieties with some 180 palms conserved in the genebank.
The survey team collected 11-12-month old niu afa coconut seedlings of varied sizes. These were taken to the Nuu Crop Development Centre where sample coconuts were split in half for characterisation and screening for true type niu afa variety. Some of the coconuts were selected for embryo culture using tissue culture methods and embryos were extracted to determine whether there is any variation in the niu afa variety.
DNA analysis will be conducted on leaf samples and seedlings. On this trip, over 300 embryos of niu afa germplasm were collected and are now conserved in tissue culture at CePaCT. CePaCT conserves unique collections of important staple crops of the Pacific including a climate-ready collection.
The survey team visited Manono, one of two islets between the two main islands of Upolu and Savaii. Sprouted seedlings of niu afa were distributed to families when the survey team visited Manono.
West of Manono are two smaller islets: Nuulopa and a much smaller un-named islet, which has just one coconut tree growing on it. Bad weather (Cyclone Tomas was in the vicinity) prevented the team from visiting neighbouring Apolima Island and collecting coconut germplasm there, and distributing niu afa seedlings.
However, plans are in place to carry out the survey on Apolima by the able team of researchers from Nu’u once the weather has cleared up.
Dr Bourdeix has developed a proposal for Samoan authorities regarding coconut conservation and management on these small islets.
He is pushing for the conservation of niu afa plus a few other coconut varieties on the resort islands because of their relative isolation.
On the small islands of the Pacific, it is proposed that only three coconut varieties are to be planted: a ‘green tall’ such as niu afa, ‘Malayan red dwarf’ and ‘Tahiti red dwarf’.
Subsequently, six new varieties will be produced from this mix without any costly controlled pollination programme and, farmers will have a diversity of coconut varieties to choose from.
It is important to spend time with the people living on the islands to identify existing varieties and to progressively remove existing coconuts once the new palms begin to bear. This is a collective decision that village authorities need to agree on. The long-term benefits are continued biodiversity.
Conservation of biodiversity on small isolated islands is part of the Polymotu project (http://polymotu.blogspot.com) that Dr Bourdeix is helping to spearhead.
The project is based on Aratika Atoll in French Polynesia, which has served as a traditional genebank for centuries. The project is advocating for islets to be devoted to the conservation of traditional coconut varieties and to the conservation of biodiversity in a broader sense.
The project is based on empirical evidence that Polynesians used numerous small isolated islands to conserve and cultivate their coconut varieties.
The geographical remoteness of the islets has ensured the reproductive isolation of the coconut palms, which is necessary for producing and maintaining a variety.