V. Rajagopal

Coconut and Areca Nut

The plantation crops, owing to their perennial nature, live through the cycles of several types of stresses. Abiotic stresses such as droughts, dry spells, high and low temperatures and floods significantly affect the growth, development and yield of the plantations. At seedling stage, the high light intensity stress causes seedling mortality if no protective measurements are taken. Studies indicated that plantation crops such as coconut impart drought tolerance through morphological, anatomical, physiological, biochemical and molecular mechanisms. The tolerant genotypes with better revival capacity are also identified. Though genotypic improvement through breeding is important, it is more important to improve the population by incorporating the progeny of identified in situ drought-tolerant and high-yielding palms. This should hasten the selection process for abiotic stress tolerance as well as for high yield as the in situ drought-tolerant palms have withstood the naturally occurring stresses in their life cycle. Apart from genetic improvement, the agronomic management becomes very important in plantation crops for sustaining the yield. Therefore, the soil moisture conservation measures and drip irrigation become very important. In this chapter, these issues are discussed in detail with research evidences with special reference to coconut.