Biology:Aquilaria malaccensis

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Short description: Species of agarwood tree from Asia

Aquilaria malaccensis
Aquilaria malaccensis - Agar Wood, Eaglewood - Indian Aloewood at Munnar (2).jpg
Aquilaria malaccensis at Munnar
Scientific classification edit
Kingdom: Plantae
Clade: Tracheophytes
Clade: Angiosperms
Clade: Eudicots
Clade: Rosids
Order: Malvales
Family: Thymelaeaceae
Genus: Aquilaria
Species:
A. malaccensis
Binomial name
Aquilaria malaccensis
Lam.
Synonyms

A. agallocha[2][3]
A. secundaria,[2][3]
A. malaccense'[3]
Agalochum malaccense[3]

Aquilaria malaccensis is a species of plant in the family Thymelaeaceae. It is found in Bangladesh, Bhutan, India , Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines , Singapore, also Thailand. It is threatened by habitat loss.[4]

The World List of Threatened Trees (Oldfield et al., 1998) listed Iran as one of the countries at the population of A. malaccensis. The exploratory 2002 CITES review confirmed that Iran has no record of the species. As a result, Iran is no longer considered as habitat for or producer of agarwood.[5]

Economics

Main page: Chemistry:Agarwood

Aquilaria malaccensis is the major source[6] of agarwood, a resinous heartwood, used for perfume and incense.[2] The resin is produced by the tree in response to infection by a parasitic ascomycetous mould, Phaeoacremonium parasitica,[7] a dematiaceous (dark-walled) fungus.

Threats

Due to rising demand for agarwood, as well as shortcomings in monitoring harvests and an increasing illegal trade, A. malaccensis is on the brink of extinction in the wild and is now considered critically endangered on the IUCN Red List. Due to large-scale logging operations, many forested areas where A. malaccensis was once abundant have been destroyed.[8]

Conservation

Despite its endangerment, Aquilaria malaccensis is highly adaptable also can perform well in areas contaminated by pollution. Due to this, conservation plans have been set in place to raise agarwood in contaminated areas as well as homestead gardens.[8]

References

  1. Harvey-Brown, Y. (2018). "Aquilaria malaccensis". IUCN Red List of Threatened Species 2018: e.T32056A2810130. doi:10.2305/IUCN.UK.2018-1.RLTS.T32056A2810130.en. https://www.iucnredlist.org/species/32056/2810130. Retrieved 14 November 2021. 
  2. 2.0 2.1 2.2 Broad, S. (1995) "Agarwood harvesting in Vietnam" TRAFFIC Bulletin 15:96
  3. 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 Anonymous (November 2003) "Alex 2: Review of Significant Trade: Aquilaria malaccensis" Significant trade in plants: Implementation of Resolution Conf. 12.8: Progress in the Implementation of Species Reviews (CITES PC14 Doc.9.2.2) Fourteenth meeting of the Plants Committee, Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna also Flora, Windhoek, Namibia
  4. Barden, Angela (2000) Heart of the Matters: Agarwood Use and Trade also CITES Implementation for Aquilaria malaccensis "Archived copy". http://www.traffic.org/news/agarwood.pdf.  TRAFFIC International, Cambridge, ISBN:1-85850-177-6
  5. -PC14 -09-02-02-A2.pdf page 47[yes|permanent dead link|dead link}}]
  6. Ng, L.T., Chang Y.S. and Kadir, A.A. (1997) "A review on agar (gaharu) producing Aquilaria species" Journal of Tropical Forest Products 2(2): pp. 272-285
  7. formerly Phialophora parasitica Crous, P. W. et al. (1996) "Phaeoacremonium gen. nov. associated with wilt and decline diseases of woody hosts and human infections." Mycologia 88(5): pp. 786–796
  8. 8.0 8.1 "Home gardens and polluted fields are helping conserve this perfume source" (in en-US). 2018-10-18. https://india.mongabay.com/2018/10/18/home-gardens-and-polluted-fields-are-helping-conserve-this-perfume-source/. 

Wikidata ☰ Q2249742 entry