Wild palm may be viable crop

Common Georgia plant could be cash crop

ALBANY, Ga. (AP)--Sometimes considered a nuisance, a common plant that grows abundantly in the forests and undeveloped pastures of southern Georgia may be an alternative cash crop for the state.

At least that's what herbalist Chuck Wanzer thinks.

The president of Botanics Trading of Blowing Rock, N.C., says Georgia landowners are missing an opportunity to earn extra money from the saw palmetto, a dwarf palm that also thrives in Florida and coastal South Carolina.

The plant's berries, about the size of olives, contain chemicals that are believed to relieve a common prostate problem in older men.

Most berries are harvested in southern Florida, where workers gathered about 40 million pounds in 2005, worth $16 million, said Wanzer, whose company is one of the nation's top exporters of the berries.

The limited harvesting in Georgia yielded 300,000 pounds, worth $120,000, said Wanzer, who is trying to develop more sources of the berries in Georgia, where there's less competition and less risk of hurricanes disrupting the harvest in August and September.

"Everybody looks at palmetto as a weed," Wanzer said. "I'm not advocating that farmers go out (and plant it) in areas where it's not growing. I'm just trying to get farmers not to kill it."

The plants with fan-shaped fonds and stalks that bristle with saw teeth seldom grow over three feet tall.

Saw palmetto is an immensely popular over-the-counter herbal remedy in the United States, but in some European countries it is one of the drugs prescribed for benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH), a non-cancerous enlargement of the prostate gland in older men that can interfere with urination.

Wanzer has been buying the berries for about 20 years and shipping about 80 percent of them to Europe.

The global market for medicinal plants such as saw palmetto has exploded in recent years, jumping from $45 billion in 2001 to $65 billion in 2004, said Enos Esikuri, a senior environmental specialist with the World Bank in Washington.

Increasing acceptance of plant-based remedies by the medical community is helping to fuel the growth, he said.

Carlton Lee, 73, of Hoboken has been gathering the berries for 20 years along with planting pine trees for five major timber companies. He's one of Georgia's largest suppliers.

This year, his workers harvested them from 100,000 leased acres in Georgia and Florida. He hopes to expand that to 500,000 acres next year.

"I walked over millions of dollars worth before I ever knew they were valuable," he said. "There's going to be more demand. More and more people around the world use them."

The plant benefits from some of the same land-management practices as trees grown to produce lumber, especially periodic "prescribed burns," fires set deliberately to clear away undesirable understory in pine forests.

"Think of it as a companion crop with the trees," said Wanzer, who visited the Sunbelt Agricultural Exposition in Moultrie last month to talk to landowners.

Since the berries are a staple for some wildlife, such as deer and turkeys, there have been concerns that berry harvesting could deprive them of food. But proponents say it's impossible to gather all the berries, so there's always an adequate supply left behind.

Mark Blumenthal, CEO of the American Botanical Council, a trade group that promotes the responsible use of herbal medicine, said saw palmetto is widely recognized for its safety and effectiveness in treating mild to moderate symptoms associated with BPH.

Among food and drug chains and mass marketers, saw palmetto ranks third in sales behind garlic, thought to reduce cholesterol and arterial plaque, and echinacea, Blumenthal said.

"It's a wonderful cash crop," he said. "It's a great opportunity for farmers and landowners."

Saw palmetto earnings would never match the amount farmers get from cotton, peanuts and other major crops, but could provide cash to help with farm bills and work for immigrant farm hands who might otherwise be idle, Wanzer said.

"Florida is the base," he said. "That's where the bulk of the berries are grown and harvested, but there are quite a few berries in Georgia."

Date: 12/21/06

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