Insight: Date palm festival celebrates Arabian culture

There is no doubting the importance of the date palm in the UAE's heritage but few people realise that more than 100 varieties are now grown here.

The UAE is the sixth largest producer of dates in the world. The wide variety of date palms and the cutting edge technology used to ensure they flourish were among the subjects discussed during the world's first International Date Palm Festival held in Al Ain this week.

The event gave delegates the chance to share experiences, expand awareness of their industry and encourage its development.

The three-day festival ended yesterday and industry insiders are already confident it has sparked renewed efforts in the cultivation of date palms in the Middle East.

Organised by the Al Ain-based Date Palm Friends Society, the festival attracted participants from 21 countries including Bah-rain, Egypt, Iraq, Italy, the United Kingdom, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Libya, Morocco, Oman, Qatar, Sudan, Tunisia, Yemen, the Philippines and Syria.

Shaikh Nahyan Bin Mubarak Al Nahyan, Minister of Education, opened the festival on Tuesday at the UAE University's Social Club.

In his inaugural speech, Shaikh Nahyan, who is also chairman of the board of directors of the Date Palm Friends Society, said the date palm was a prime food source and had deep roots in Arabian culture and heritage.

Large varieties of date palms, their produce, agricultural technology and support services were displayed at 85 pavilions in the exhibition's main exhibition hall. The event attracted visitors from various UAE cities and neighbouring GCC states.

Objectives

According to Dr Abdul Wahab Zaid, director and chief technical advisor for the UAE University's Date Palm Research and Development Programme, the aim of the festival was to access date cultivation and its problems, identify the best date varieties and encourage date production and marketing through the exchange of expertise between date growers and processors.

The organisers said the event was a platform for international experts to exchange their views and experiences in developing and producing high-quality dates.

A symposium was also held on Wednesday in which the UAE and foreign experts shed light on the nutritious qualities of dates and the use of new technology in date farming.

Exhibitors were asked to display date varieties, by-products, photographs, cultivation technologies and the health and nutritional benefits of dates. There was also a heritage display, scientific journals and books, specialised film shows and a display of date processing equipment.

The by-products of dates were also displayed and delegates were able to view plants derived from tissue culture along with a description of the appropriate technical practices.

Dr Hadef Bin Jouan Al Daheri, vice-chancellor of UAE University, said the festival had succeeded in achieving its aims and objectives and the visitors had appreciated the immense value of the date palm after gaining a better understanding of its agricultural use.

The exhibition was dedicated to Shaikh Zayed Bin Sultan Al Nahyan, who was praised for promoting agriculture, particularly the farming of date palms over almost half a century.

"It was a huge task to organise such an event, but a very important one," Dr Zaid said, adding that the Date Palm Friends Society had been supported by UAE University, the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries, the Private Department of Shaikh Zayed Bin Sultan Al Nahyan, the Department of Agriculture and Animal Resources, Al Ain Municipality and Town Planning Department, Emirates Dates Factory, Saudi American Plant Development and the Al Bateen Wedding Service Establishment.

Dr Al Daheri said annual world date production exceeded six million tonnes last year.

"The UAE has engaged in continuous efforts to make the best use of available resources and increase agricultural productivity," he said.

More than 42 million date palm trees have been planted in the UAE in the last three decades as part of the country's green revolution.

Tissue culture

The UAE uses modern agricultural technology, including tissue cultures, which has led to the successful exploitation of dozens of new varieties of highly productive date palms.

The UAE's application of this research has made the country a leading date producer in the Arabian Gulf.

Tissue culture program-mes are being performed at the laboratories of the Date Palm Research and Development Programme, which is a joint venture research facility of UAE University and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).

It is the world's first ISO 9001 and 2000 quality certified date palm research venture and has been producing more than 150,000 plants a year in its 17 greenhouses, six nurseries and six tissue culture growth chambers in Al Ain.

The programme started introducing new date palm varieties in November 2000.

The first successfully produced varieties at the programme's laboratories included Khlass, Barhee, Hilali, Sukkari, Khenezi, Maktoumi, Khissab, Jabri and Abu Maan.