As we come close to the end of the year 1999 and set our sights on what could happen in the year 2000 and beyond, there is much to be gained from pursuing the functional properties of coconut for improving the health of humanity.

On the occasion of the 30th anniversary of the Asian Pacific Coconut Community, at this 36th meeting of APCC, I wanted to bring you a message that I hope will encourage you to continue your endeavors on behalf of all parts of the coconut industry. Coconut products for inedible and especially edible uses are of the greatest importance for the health of the entire world.

Some of what I have been telling you, most of you already know. But in saying these things for the record, it is my intention to tell those who did not know all the details until they heard or read this paper about the positive properties of coconut.

Coconut oil is a most important oil because it is a lauric oil. The lauric fats possess unique characteristics for both food industry uses and also for the uses of the soaps and cosmetic industries. Because of the unique properties of coconut oil, the fats and oils industry has spent untold millions to formulate replacements from those seed oils so widely grown in the world outside the tropics. While it has been impossible to truly duplicate coconut oil for some of its applications, many food manufacturers have been willing to settle for lesser quality in their products. Consumers have also been willing to settle for a lesser quality, in part because they have been fed so much misinformation about fats and oils.

Desiccated coconut, on the other hand, has been impossible to duplicate, and the markets for desiccated coconut have continued. The powdered form of desiccated coconut now being sold in Europe and Asia has yet to find a market in the U.S., but I predict that it will become an indispensable product in the natural foods industry. Creamed coconut, which is desiccated coconut very finely ground, could be used as a nut butter.

APCC needs to promote the edible uses of coconut, and it needs to promote the reeducation of the consumer, the clinician, and the scientist. The researcher H. Thormar (Thormar et al 1999) concluded his abstract with the statement that monocaprin "...is a natural compound found in certain foodstuffs such as milk and is therefore unlikely to cause harmful side effects in the concentrations used." It is not monocaprin that is found in milk, but capric acid. It is likely safe at most any level found in food. However, the levels in milk fat are at most 2 percent whereas the levels in coconut fat are 7 percent.