Assume production of 100 nuts per tree per year; this is a
number consistent with several published values.
Therefore, the total
number of coconuts available per year is:
33,792 trees x 100 nuts= 3,379,200 nuts
tree-year
year
Now, lets look at how many coconuts will be. consumed per year
according to the diet proposed by the author (table III of the report)
assuming that women consume 2/3 and children 1/2 of the male diet and
that the population will consist of 200 men, 200 women and 200 children.
These population figures are not unreasonable for the population a few
years after return.
The results are given in Table 1.
The total number
of cocounts consumed according to theauthors diet is 2,879,600.
is 85% of the total available production of 3,379,200 cocounts.
leaves hardly anything for a copra crop.
This.
This
To put it another way, they would
have to plant 26% of the available land area to supply simply the dietary
needs-nothing yet said about
a cash copra crop!
In summary the coconut diet is totally unrealistic.
In fact if they
were eating as many drinking cocounts as the author suggests and harvesting
the remaining ones for copra it would be nearly impossible for a ‘coconut
to fall to the ground and become a sprouting coconut.
2.
A second way to look at this proposed coconut intake is from
a dietary standpoint.
On page 11 the daily intake based on the authors
proposed diet is 2.05 kg/day for cocount meat and 2.6 kg/day of coconut fluid
for a total consumption for coconut of 4.65 kg/day.
For comparison, the
average U.S. daily intake of all foods is 1.75 kg per day (from
Supplement
for 1975 to Agricultural Report No. 138, U.S.D.A., “Food,Consumption, Prices,
Expenditures." January 1977) or 0.78 kg/day according to Bramlitts reference.
—
ee nearere ate