The sugar palm is a national symbol for Cambodia. Harvested by the country’s poor for centuries, no part of the palm tree goes to waste in a process that fashions the tree into a range of products.
A Cambodian worker stirs palm sugar in a vat as visitors to a refinery look on.
The durable and strong leaves are woven into baskets, the sap is collected and processed into a nutritious sugar and, to this day, villagers from local communities come together to use the wood from the bark to build homes for families in need.
Given palm sugar’s usefulness, it did not take long for businessmen and agriculture experts to see the potential of the product. Following Cambodia’s accession to the World Trade Organisation in 2004, palm sugar grown in Kampong Speu province was awarded Geographic Indicator status just six years later, putting it on the shortlist of high-quality goods.
Even though palm sugar is grown in other countries such as Ethiopia, India, Indonesia and Tanzania, sugar experts have said that because of its taste and high amount of nutrients, Cambodian-grown palm sugar has the potential to become the Champagne of all sugars. However, regardless of the myriad potential benefits, Cambodia’s palm sugar industry remains in its infancy.
“People keep saying that palm sugar is our national symbol, but they do nothing to show it and to let the world know about it,” said Dr Hay Ly Eang, the CEO of Confirel, Cambodia’s largest palm sugar producer.
Although a few companies sell small quantities of palm sugar locally, only Confirel has found a home for it in international markets, such as the United States and Europe, while also offering a range of other palm sugar-based products, including wine, whiskey, vinegar, handicrafts, candies and even a sparkling wine.
Climbing tall trees to obtain sweet resin is risky and adds to costs.
“What does it take for the sugar palm tree to be the national symbol? That is the question for which this company exists. Because the sugar tree is the tree of the poor, to be able to make something more out of it has been my inspiration,” says Dr Hay.
Established in 2001, Confirel now uses more than 2,000 palm sugar trees in Kampong Speu to generate about 10 tonnes of sugar for its products each year. However, with only a small percentage of Cambodia’s 3 million sugar palms being exploited commercially, Confirel is eager to explore the potential of these palms.
However, there is a problem with the otherwise promising industry. Harvesting palm sugar is an arduous and sometimes deadly task as farmers have to scale the towering trees—as high as 30 metres—in order to collect the sweet resin. It is a hurdle that is both hindering the production of palm sugar on a larger scale and its ability to compete with other sugars in terms of cost.
“You have to find a niche market to sell palm sugar. The cost is high given the risk of climbing the trees and the subsequent cost of labour is higher than that of cane sugar, so the price for palm sugar will be high,” said Chan Sophal, president of the Cambodian Economic Association. “A market for palm sugar depends very much on demand and if customers will be willing to pay a lot of money for the supply.”
Such high production costs currently put the retail price of palm sugar between $4 and $5 per kilogramme, far higher than that of more easily produced cane sugar, which costs consumers only $1 per kilogramme.
Kompong Speu, located just west of Phnom Penh, features fertile soil able to produce high-yield palm trees. With more than 80% of Cambodians working rural jobs, mostly on farms, and earning less than $2 a day, many people in Kompong Speu work several short-term jobs that are often labour-intensive as many live in makeshift homes compiled from discarded tin and wood.
As part of a three-week mission for PUM — a non-profit organisation funded by the Dutch government that provides expertise to businesses in developing countries for free — Rene van Slooten, a Dutch national with 46 years of expertise in sugar production, came to Cambodia at the end of last year and helped Dr Hay develop the potential of Confirel’s production line.
“It is a very good sugar. It’s a special sugar — the Champagne of sugars,” van Slooten exclaimed. “Palm sugar enjoys a mixture of several sugars, but it also attracts moisture so it is difficult at this moment to make products that will last on the shelves.
“The ingredients to prevent that are not yet available here, so I plan to bring what is needed to give it a better quality, texture and taste.”
He added that if Cambodia’s palm sugar industry could find the right mixture of preservatives and more efficient harvesting and production practices, the sky is the limit.
“Palm sugar has a very nice taste for a range of products, such as coffee and tea, and a nice aroma in chocolates and sweets,” he said. “Cambodia is one of the few palm sugar distributors in the world and has a better quality than in other producing countries such as Indonesia. There is good potential here.”
Another comparative advantage of Cambodian palm sugar is that the combination of the right terrain and temperature helps trees physically produce more of the sweet product in a given harvest, van Slooten said.
“Sure, it produces lots per day,” he said. “I’ve seen some [palm trees in other countries] make less than half a kilogramme per day. In Cambodia each tree can make up to one kilogramme in a day, but that harvesting that will require a lot more workers since they have to go up and get it more than once a day.”
Despite its high production volume, the harvesting season for palm sugar only lasts from November to March with specimen giving between three and six months’ worth of sap. Newly planted trees take up to 15 years to mature before they produce any sugar, but after that, they can produce sap for 55 years.
With palm sugar now in circulation in Siem Reap and Phnom Penh, thanks to entrepreneurs such as Dr Hay, chefs are finding more ways to put its unique qualities to work to step up the country’s traditionally rural cuisine scene.
“I like to use it in a sauce for foie gras or we will use it with a tomato sauce because the aroma is a nice woody scent, while it adds a different taste that customers like,” said Sopheak Pov, head chef at one of Phnom Penh’s finest designer restaurants, Topaz, adding that palm sugar also works well in a creme brulee.
Stocked with one of the largest wine cellars in the city, Topaz has for years catered to western and local tastes alike under the roof of a modified French villa, offering gourmet local and western dishes.
“The smell [of palm sugar] adds a hint of vinegar, which is better and along with the woody smell, adding a quality to some dishes that the regular sugar does not have,” he said.
“But it’s not for every dish since we don’t want to overpower some already aromatic dishes, such is the case with our chicken stew, where I choose not to use palm sugar because in this dish we use a red wine and the smell is already what we need.”