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Palm oil block showing the lighter color that results from boiling. Palm oil is an edible vegetable oil derived from the mesocarp (reddish pulp) of the fruit of oil palms. [1] The oil is used in food manufacturing, in beauty products, and as biofuel. Palm oil accounted for about 36% of global oils produced from oil crops in 2014. [2]
Oil palms (Elaeis guineensis) Oil palm fruit is one of the most widely produced primary crops in the world.. An estimated 1.5 million small farmers grow the crop in Indonesia, along with about 500,000 people directly employed in the sector in Malaysia, plus those connected with related industries.
Palm oil formed the basis of soap products, such as Lever Brothers' (now Unilever) "Sunlight", and B. J. Johnson Company's (now Colgate-Palmolive) "Palmolive," [8] and by around 1870, palm oil constituted the primary export of some West African countries. [9] In 1780, Carl Wilhelm Scheele demonstrated that fats were derived from glycerol.
A 2006 study supported by the National Institutes of Health and the USDA Agricultural Research Service concluded that palm oil is not a safe substitute for partially hydrogenated fats (trans fats) in the food industry, because palm oil results in adverse changes in the blood concentrations of LDL and apolipoprotein B just as trans fat does.
Elaeis guineensis, the African oil palm, the major palm oil crop species; but also: Attalea maripa, the maripa palm; Cocos nucifera, the coconut palm, which yields coconut oil from its seeds; Elaeis oleifera, the American oil palm; The genus Elaeis, with just two species, E. guineensis and E. oleifera, referred to as the oil-palm genus
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Oil from Elaeis guineensis is also used as biofuel. Human use of oil palms may date back to about 5,000 years in coastal west Africa. Palm oil was also discovered in the late 19th century by archaeologists in a tomb at Abydos dating back to 3000 BCE. [6] It is thought that Arab traders brought the oil palm to Egypt. [citation needed]
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