Palm oil has been treated by partial lipase hydrolysis and by interesterification with excess glycerol and the effects on the chemical and physical properties have been investigated. Lipase hydrolysis preferentially removes unsaturated acids and the neutral glycerides remaining after removal of the free fatty acids therefore have an increased solids content at 20°C. Both differential scanning calorimetry (d.s.c.) and X-ray examination show that the crystalline phases present above 20°C are more heterogeneous after lipase treatment. Interesterification results in a mixture of tri-and diglycerides with an increased solids content at 20°C and a marked tendency to form / 3 phase crystals. Some potential practical applications are discussed.

The process of preparing oil palm seed for planting generates vast quantities of waste pulp. The pulp (ca. 80% oil), for which no use has been found, is indiscriminately dumped because either reprocessing it into a useful product or disposing of it properly is expensive. In situ transesterification of the pulp with methanol and ethanol using sulfuric acid as catalyst was carried out on a laboratory scale. Our aim was to develop a process to recover the largely hydrolytically degraded oil (PV, 25-26; FFA, 25-26%) from the pulp. Acid-catalyzed conversions of the oil into alkyl esters were 96-97% for both methanol and ethanol. The accompanying concentrations of FFA, TG, DG, and MG were low. The identities and proportions of FA ester in the alkyl esters reflected the FA content of the palm oil. The values for the esterified products of some fuel properties such as cloud point and viscosity were slightly below the general current specification. However, with optimization of the reaction conditions and simplification of some of the technical aspects, the waste pulp could be a good source of alkyl esters for both oleochemical and fuel applications.Paper no. J10237 in JAOCS 80, 77-80 (January 2003). KEY WORDS:Alkyl esters, oil palm, palm oil, pulp, transesterification. tory funnel was added 200 mL of distilled water. The re-

SUMMARYTwo varieties of okra were sown at approximately 14-day intervals from 1 April to 1 June for 2 years during the main rainy season in Nigeria. Low soil temperature and moisture, which resulted from a combined effect of high solar radiation, high atmospheric temperature and low rainfall, led to poor seedling emergence at the early sowing dates.The growth of the fewer plants of the early sowing dates were more vigorous than those of later sowing dates and they attained 50% flowering earlier and had a longer harvest duration. This resulted in increases in number of pods per plant, pod length, pod diameter, pod volume, pod weight and pod yield per ha, indicating compensatory growth by the fewer plants in the early plantings. The relatively lower values obtained for these variables with the late sowing dates were also attributed to possible poor soil aeration arising from the increased rainfall during their growth period.Sowing dates did not generally affect the percentage moisture, oil and protein in the pods. The effects of varieties on the variables measured were more uniform than those of sowing dates and mostly not significant.

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