FPU 501 FOREST PRODUCT MANAGEMENT (2+1)

NEW TECHNOLOGIES FOR EXTRACTION, PROCESSING, VALUE ADDITION,

QUALITY ASSESSMENT, MARKETING AND STORAGE METHODS OF AGARWOOD

Presented By
Praveen Raj N
Jnr. M.sc
 Contents

• Introduction

• Formation of agarwood

• Harvesting and grading

• Extraction of essential oil

• Value addition

• Marketing
 INTRODUCTION
• The plant family Thymelaeaceae is known for its incense producing tree species, especially from the
genera Aquilaria. Endemic to the Indomalayan region, there are a total of 21 recorded Aquilaria spp.

• Range: Bangladesh, Bhutan, Cambodia, China, India, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Papua New
Guinea, Thailand and Vietnam.

• The tree has the unique feature of producing resin impregnated heartwood which is fragrant and
economically highly valued depending on the oleoresin content of the wood.

• The wood is used to manufacture some of the medicines, incense and perfumes across Asia and
Europe.

• The agarwood is reputed to be the most expensive wood in the world and in the consumer countries it
ranged from a few dollars per kg for low quality material to more than US$30,000 per kg of top quality
wood
 INTRODUCTION

Main producer species of agarwood:

• A.malaccensis (synonyms: A.agallocha, A.secundaria),

• A.crassna

• A.sinensis

Others:
A. baillonii , A. beccariana , A. filaria , A. hirta , A. khasiana ,
A. microcarpa , A. rostrata , A. rugosa ,A. subintegra and
A. yunnanensis
 FORMATION OF AGARWOOD
• Agarwood formation in natural forests takes a long time.
Therefore, artificial injury to stems of planted Aquilaria trees
is an alternative to trigger agarwood formation.

• Responding to wounded tissues, tree produces resin, which is

high in volatile organic compounds, to suppress fungal
growth. This process is called tylosis.

• Generally, unaffected wood has relatively light color, while

the resin increases the density and changes the color of
affected wood to dark brown or black.
 FORMATION OF AGARWOOD

Natural factors Cause

Create wounds for pathogenic microbes to enter and trigger the
• Thunder strikes
tree’s defense system
• Broken branches
• Animal grazing Disadvantage :
• Unsustainable, undetermined and extremely low yield
• Pest and disease
• Require extensive and indiscriminately harvesting of wild trees
• Infestations
Advantage :
• Possible to obtain high quality agarwood
• No cultivation, plantation and induction required
 FORMATION OF AGARWOOD
Cause
Conventional methods
Physical wounds of the tree will trigger the agarwood
• Physical wounding formation.
• Burning-chisel-drilling Disadvantage
• Partial-trunk-pruning • Laborious
• Longer time is required to get the agarwood with
• Wounding using axe
uncertain quality
• Bark removal
• Localized agarwood formation only at the injured
• Cutting areas
• Nailing Advantage
Cost effective
 FORMATION OF AGARWOOD
Biological Inducers
Some fungal strain used for
induction including
• Aspergillus sp.,
• Chaetomium sp.,
• Fusarium sp.,
• Lasiodiplodia sp.,
• Penicillium sp.,
• Xylaria sp.
Cause
Introducing microbial cultures into the tree to mimic pathological infection
to Aquilaria.
Disadvantage
• Require a long incubation time and localized agarwood formation at the
inoculated area
• Inconsistency of agarwood quality due to different fungal strains or
species used
Advantage
• Microbial cultures can be prepared at low cost and easily available
• Biological agents are obtained from natural source and often relate to be
safe for handling and environmental friendly
 FORMATION OF AGARWOOD
Chemical inducers
Phytohormones, salts,
minerals, biological-derived
substances, and others, e.g.,
NaCl, H2O2, formic acid,
Agar-wit.
Cause
Induce tree’s defense mechanism directly with either chemicals or
signaling molecules
Disadvantage
• Skeptical impact on human health and environment
• Need to be applied at the right dose to obtain optimal strength of
induction
Advantages
• Fast results and high yields
• Easy to apply in large-scale plantations
• Consistent yield and quality
• Can induce agarwood formation in the whole tree/systemic
manner
A-no induction or injury

B-drill the stems, roots and large brunches The

drilled pores were kept open to ease access of natural
agents into the pores.

C-Metal or PVC tubes were installed in those pores to

prevent healing the pores and establish prolonged
infection.

D-Syringe with inocula and inducers were also used to

assist batch and continuous inoculation and
induction.

E-In some region, indigenous people peel off the

bark to promote infection to the core tissues and
harvest the chips of woods

F-There are certain areas where a hole was dug in the

tree to facilitate hatching of ants and snails which is
being believed to be responsible for
agarwood formation
WHOLE TREE AGARWOOD INDUCING TECHNIQUE
• Recently, a chemical inducer with an innovative delivery
system has been invented which can induce agarwood
formation in the whole tree. The patented technology is
known as the ‘‘Whole-tree Agarwood-Inducing
Technique’’ (Agar-WIT)

• Through this technology, less than 2 years is needed to

produce agarwood of high quality.

• The method implements a device functioning as a drip bag

to slowly release the liquid chemical into the tree through a
drilled hole and then relies on the tree’s transportation
system to distribute the chemical throughout the tree.
WHOLE TREE AGARWOOD INDUCING TECHNIQUE
WHOLE TREE AGARWOOD INDUCING TECHNIQUE

• They inject agarwood inducers into the xylem part of

Aquilaria trees through these transfusion sets.

• Due to water transportation, the inducers are

transported to the whole body of the tree, thus
forming an overall wound in the tree, and as a result,
agarwood is finally formed in the trees in a short
period of time.

• To evaluate the agarwood quantity and quality

induced by the Agar-Wit, the harvested agarwood was
analyzed and compared with that produced by the
three existing agarwood-inducing methods.
Agarwood inducing techniques

(a) The whole-tree agarwood-

(b) The partly-trunk-pruning method (PTP)
inducing technique (Agar-Wit).

(c) The burning-chisel-drilling (d) The fungi-inoculation method (FI).

method (BCD).
The process of resin formation after being treated with Agar-Wit. (a) One week; (b) 6 months; (c) 20 months.
Agarwood inducing techniques :
• Agar-wit: very small holes deep into the xylem were drilled above 50 cm from the ground of the main trunk by an
electric drill. The agarwood inducer was slowly injected into the xylem tissues through a transfusion set
• . Capital letters A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J respectively represented ten different agarwood inducers.

• PTP: cuts of 2–4 cm wide and 3–5 cm deep were sawed along one side of the main trunk of an A. sinensis tree. The
first cut was about 50 cm above the ground. The space between every two cuts was about 20 cm.

• BCD: the holes in the trunk from approximately 50 cm above the ground to the top of the trunk were achieved by a
burning and red-hot iron drill bit (1.2 cm wide). The holes on the trunk of each tree were approximately 20 cm apart.

• FI : From 50 cm above the ground of a trunk, holes of approximately 8 cm deep were made by a drill. The culture
medium Melanotus flavolivens was inserted as the bait into each hole, which was then wrapped by rubberized fabrics.
Materials used in study
Result
• Almost all oil from the induced agarwood with the color of yellow to brown and gave out a peculiar aroma similar to
that of wild agarwood oil.
• These values were close to those of the two wild agarwood, which were respectively 0.345%. The oil yield of the
agarwood obtained by BCD was 0.199%, and that by the other two existing methods was less than 0.1%, close to those
of NK and CK, while far less than that by Agar-Wit.
Discussion

• By the novel Agar-Wit, the yield per tree reached 6 kg after six months, 4 times higher than by the BCD method, 6
times higher than by the FI, and 28 times higher than by the PTP.

• The agarwood inducer was conveniently injected into the xylem of A. sinensis trees through the transfusion sets. Due to
water transpiration pull, the agarwood inducer was transported to the whole tree and led to wounds in the whole
tree.

• This wounding led to agarwood formation in the whole tree from the trunks to the roots and lateral branches. This is the
first report concerning steady, expected and high-yield technique for agarwood production in the Aquilaria genus.

• The Agar-Wit can produce high-quality agarwood at a high and steady yield. This efficient candidate technique has been
patented in China (CN101755629B, CN101731282B) [15,30] , and PCT applications have been filed for Vietnam,
Malaysia, Philippines, India and Indonesia (PCT/CN2012/071599)
ESSENTIAL OIL EXTRACTION
• As agar products are traded both as chips and oil form, extraction of agar oils from agarwood has a great
importance.
• Generally most of the trade essential oils are volatile, practically stable to the action of heat and
insoluble in water therefore are fit for processing by distillation.

There are three methods through which agarwood oils can be extracted namely,
• Hydro-distillation
• Steam distillation
• Supercritical CO2 extraction.
ESSENTIAL OIL EXTRACTION
Steam distillation

• Steam distillation is widely used in

Indonesia.

• Normally the oil is subjected to higher

temperatures above 250 degrees
fahrenheit.

• Some of the distillers dislike for steam

distillation when it comes to oud. Yet
some oud , were steam distilled.
Hydro Distillation

• Boil the wood and the resin rises to the top;

from there you funnel it into a glass vessel
where it gathers over the course of several days,
floating atop the water.

• This is the oldest, most widely used method in

Southeast Asia and Assam.
ESSENTIAL OIL EXTRACTION
MICROWAVE DISTILLATION
Agarwood (Aquilaria malaccensis) obtained from Merauke, Indonesia in the form of powder
and chopped woods (± 2cm). Distilled water and n-hexane used in the experimental work
were all of analytical grade.
1.MICROWAVE HYDRO DISTILLATION
• In the agarwood oil extraction using microwave hydro distillation, distilled water (50 mL) and agarwood
(powder and chopped size) were put in a series of round bottom flasks.
• The extraction was carried out for 12 hour under microwave power 300, 450, and 600 W.
2.SOLVENT FREE MICROWAVE EXTRACTION
• This process consists of the microwave-assisted dry distillation of a fresh plant matrix without adding water
or any organic solvent.
RESULT
• The selective heating of the insitu water content of plant material causes tissues to swell and
makes the glands and oleiferous receptacles burst.
• This process thus frees essential oil, which is evaporated by azeotropic distillation with the water
present in the plant material.
Traditional systems of quality assessment & grading

Agarwood is traditionally graded by

physical senses. It is evaluated based
on resin content

• sinkage in water
• color
• scent/aroma
• agarwood-inducing method
• formation time
• place of origin
Modern systems of grading
Modern systems of grading
Image Processing Technique

Percentage of grey scale value

range will calculated during this
phase.

The higher percentage of grey

scale value range, the better
grade of Agar Wood.
Quality assessment of Agarwood oil
• Sesquiterpenes components and its
chromone derivative were the major
compounds in agarwood oil. The composition
of the compounds, determine the high and
low quality of agarwood oil.

• The highest quality of agarwood oil has a lot

of resin which means that it contains various
kind of oxygenated sesquiterpenes and
chromone derivatives

• There are different techniques being used to

analyse the quality of agarwood oil (i.e. high
and low) gas chromatograph (GC) charts and
thin layer chromatogram (TLC).
Quality assessment of Agarwood oil
Modern systems of quality assessment
E NOSE

• Recently, an intelligent grading technique for the agarwood

Oil quality was developed based on advanced signal
processing of E-nose measurements.

• Electronic nose (e-nose) may be used to resolve these issues.

A commercial e-nose was used to collect the smell
(fragrance) data (herein termed as ‘smellprint’) which
was then processed on a personal computer using different
pattern recognition methods

• It could be perspective that in the future, such a technique can

be further utilized on other characteristic such as the origin,
color, and resin content of agarwood, and finally substitute
the human experience.
VALUE ADDITION
VALUE ADDITION

COSMETICS

ESSENTIAL OIL

PERFUMES
VALUE ADDITION

INCENSE CONES

INCENSE STICKS

INCENSE POWDER
TABLETS
VALUE ADDITION
VALUE ADDITION
MARKET AND TRADE

• Agarwood's scarcity and the

difficulty in its formation
have made it one of the most
expensive and sought-after
natural resources globally.

• The expansion in retail space

across the globe is a key
factor driving the market
growth.

The most common distribution formats of agarwood essential oils are supermarkets and hypermarkets, convenience
stores and online portals.
MARKETING CHANNEL
IMPORT AND EXPORT
PRODUCT SEGMENTATION
Europe is observing high demand for agarwood essential oils due to various health benefits and multiple
applications across multiple industries, such as therapeutics, cosmetics, and personal care.

Germany, the UK, France, and Spain are some of the leading markets for the sales of agarwood essential oils
in Europe.
CONCLUSION

In conclusion, agarwood is a fascinating natural resource with a rich history and cultural significance. Its
unique fragrance, along with its potential medicinal properties, has made it highly valuable and sought-
after.

As we move forward, it is crucial to strike a balance between meeting market demand and ensuring the
long-term sustainability and conservation of agarwood-producing trees.
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and Management Sciences, 3
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classifier using machine
• learning. Journal of Fundamental and Applied Sciences, 9
• Guenther E., Essential Oils Volume IVB (in Bahasa Indonesia), Jakarta: Universitas Indonesia Press, 1990.
• China Pharmacopoeia Commission, vol. 1, Chinese Medicine Science and Technology Publishing House,
Beijing, 2010,
• P. E. Keller, "Mimicking biology: Applications of cognitive systems to electronic noses," 1999, pp.
• P. Gerard, "Agarwood: the life of a wounded tree,“ IIAS Newsletter, vol. 45, pp, 2007
• Chakrabarty K, Kuner A, Manon V (1994) Trade in agarwood, WWF-India
• Hansen E (2000) The hidden history of scented wood. Saudi Aramco World.
• Zhang, X. L., Liu, Y. Y., Wei, J. H., Yang, Y., Zhang, Z., Huang, J. Q., et al. (2012). Production of high-quality
agarwood in Aquilaria sinensis trees via whole-tree agarwood-induction technology.
• Xu, Y., Zhang, Z., Wang, M., Wei, J., Chen, H., Gao, Z., et al. (2013). Identification of genes related to agarwood
formation: transcriptome analysis of healthy and wounded tissues of Aquilaria sinensis. BMC Genomics 14:227. doi:
10.1186/1471-2164-14-227.
THANK YOU