Aromatic Plants Cultivation, Processing and Uses

Aromatic plants have essential or aromatic oils naturally occurring in them. They help heal mental ailments and other diseases. India is endowed with a rich wealth of medicinal plants. Aromatic (Aroma Producing) plants are those plants which produce a certain type of aroma. Their aroma is due to the presence of some kind of essential oil with chemical constituents that contain at least one benzene ring in the their chemical configuration. The chemical nature of these aromatic substances may be due to a variety of complex chemical compounds. These plants have made a good contribution to the development of ancient Indian material medica. In recent years, there has been a tremendous growth of interest in plant based drugs, pharmaceuticals, perfumery products, cosmetics and aroma compounds used in food flavors and fragrances and natural colors in the world. There is a definite trend to adopt plant based products due to the cumulative derogatory effects resulting from the use of antibiotic and synthetics and except for a few cultivated crops, the availability of plant based material is mainly from the natural sources like forests and wastelands. There is a need to introduce these crops into the cropping system of the county, which, besides meeting the demands of the industry, will also help to maintain the standards on quality, potency and chemical composition. During the past decade, demand for aromatic plants and its products has attracted the worldwide interest, India being the treasure house of biodiversity, accounts for thousands of species which are used in herbal drugs. 90% of herbal industry requirement of raw material is taken out from the forests. Some fundamentals of this book are botanical description of the plant, genetic improvement , harvesting, intercropping, transplantation, irrigation and weeding, vanilla cultivation in india, commercial cultivation of vanilla, distillation of herbage for essential oil, effect of growth hormones, jasmine crop improvement & agrotechniques, efforts for new vatiety of jasminum auriculatum , essential oils of agarwood, cinnamomum tamala leaves, eucalyptus citriodora and caultheria pragrantissima, past and future of sandal wood oil industry, by product development from turmeric and ginger rhizomes, isolation of essential oils and its flavour profile etc. This book contains most of the important aspects related to aromatic plants. It is being published for those who are interested in growing, processing and trading of aromatic plants.