Tissue cultured sandalwood soon

BANGALORE: Procuring sandalwood plants will no longer be a problem in the state now, as the city-based Institute of Wood Science and Technology (IWST) is commercially launching tissue-cultured sandalwood plants (developed in the Institute laboratory) in another six months’ time.Addressing the media on Monday, S C Joshi, Director, IWST said, “There has been a huge gap in the demand and supply of sandalwood oil in the state.The import of sandalwood has increased tremendously, about 60-70 percent of the requirement is being imported from other states.Keeping all this in mind, we have already begun with a protocol for producing tissue-culture sandalwood plants.” “We are getting the tissue culture from Hosur and raising them at our IWST laboratory” he added.Speaking to The New Indian Express about the process involved, Vignesh K, Junior Research Fellow, IWST, working for the project said, “The sandalwood tissue culture are kept in the laboratory at a room temperature of 26 degree Celsius and maintained at 65 percent humidity with 12 hours of photo period.Major nutrients are also being provided.” “The sandalwood plants raised through tissue culture are of much higher quality compared to those which are generated from seeds.All the tissue culture we are raising here, are high oil yielders, disease resistant and fast growing.Every month we are getting about 600-700 plantable sandalwood material” he added.“The project is on since 2000 and the research is still going on.In another couple of days we will start with the field trail,” said another research fellow.MEET ON ‘ART AND JOY OF WOOD’The IWST is holding an international conference on ‘Art and Joy of Wood’ starting from October 19-22, announced S C Joshi, Director, IWST.Hosted by the Ministry of Environment and Forests in collaboration with the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO), the conference is aimed at understanding how wood can make a greater contribution to sustainable development and to discuss how wood producers and users can benefit from increased prosperity and the growing demands for more sustainable consumption and lifestyles in the fast changing economic scenario of the world.Delegates from around 16 countries (USA, UK, Australia, Malaysia, Singapore, China and Taiwan to name a few) and 40 exhibitors will be participating in the conference.MUSEUM AND TRAINING CENTRE AT IWSTThe IWST will soon be housing a wood museum.If everything works out as planned, the wood museum, which will be the first of its kind in the country will be inaugurated in October, said, SC Joshi, Director, IWST.“Through this initiative, we want to showcase comprehensive wood science, basic wood and the technology to students and general citizens,” he said.Meanwhile, the IWST is also coming up with an advanced training centre for wood processing within a year.Addressing the media Dr V K Bahuguna, Director General, ICFRE, said, “Rs 8 crore has already been sanctioned for the project, of which Rs 70 lakh have been utilised to purchase various equipment for providing training to wood artisans, carpenters and handicrafts- men for the centre.”