Assessment of yield and nutritional composition of fruit of wild date palm (Phoenix sylvestris Roxb.) cultivars

摘要

Present study was conducted to estimate yearly fruit yield and subsequent analysis of nutritional contents of fruits of wild date palm at Rutab stage of fruit development. In this regard predominantly available five wild date palm cultivars were selected. It was found that studied wild date palm produced 31.50- 34.00 kg year-1per plant of fresh fruit. Fruit production greatly reduced in tapped plants which could be due to the preparation of taping surface for palm sap collection. It was also found that studied cultivars contain 49.04 – 51.60 % of fruit pulp. Nutrition composition analysis showed that fruit contain good amount of crude protein which was 3.12 – 3.55 g 100g-1 ,less amount of crude fat 0.45 – 0.61 g 100 g-1 and high amount of sugar 41.65 – 47.41 g 100 g-1 on dry weight basis. The analysis also showed that it contain adequate amount of crude fiber which was 12.45 – 13.87 g 100g-1 (dry weight) and also yielded good amount of ash with 4.27 – 6.29 g 100 g-1 (dry weight). The ascorbic acid content was found between 11.88- 20.75 mg 100g-1.The obtained results suggest that wild date fruit, which contain good amount of nutritional properties could be used as vital nutrient source of the region.