9/5/07 (Daily Express)   - Kota Kinabalu: The Sawit Kinabalu Berhad Group has successfully produced the first DxP oil palm clone from leaf ex-plant through tissue culture techniques from its biotechnology laboratory in Tawau.

It is believed that this is the first DxP clone produced in Sabah.

In announcing this achievement, the Group Managing Director of Sawit Kinabalu Berhad Group, Salim Mohammad, thanked Sawit Kinabalu Berhad Chairman-cum-Chief Minister, Datuk Seri Musa Aman, for his far-sightedness of clones by tissue culture.

The signing and collaboration agreements on tissue culture of oil palm between Sawith Kinabalu Berhad and Malaysian Palm Oil Board (MPOB) on Aug. 23, 2004 in Kuala Lumpur was witnessed by Musa.

Salim commended MPOB for their support to enable Sawit Kinabalu to produce the first clonal DxP material in a record time of only two years from initiation.

He felt that this progress augured well with the Sabah Biotechnology Action Blueprint 2006-2015 launched by Musa on April 19, 2007.

Oil palm planting materials from tissue culture are expected to produce 30 per cent more fruit bunches and oil than conventional planting materials from seeds.

Salim said the source materials for tissue culture at Sawit Kinabalu Berhad were from its proven high yielding DxP palms researched at its seed production and breeding unit also in Tawau.

The current biotechnology laboratory of Sawit Kinabalu which has a capacity of 30,000 plantlets per annum are in the process of expanding to a capacity of 200,000 plantlets per annum.

Initially, all the clonal materials from this laboratory would be for internal uses. Sawit Kinabalu is expected to make available the clonal materials to public in 2009.