Khalas () is a
cultivar
A cultivar is a kind of Horticulture, cultivated plant that people have selected for desired phenotypic trait, traits and which retains those traits when Plant propagation, propagated. Methods used to propagate cultivars include division, root a ...
of the palm
date
Date or dates may refer to:
* Date, the fruit of the date palm (''Phoenix dactylifera'')
* Jujube, also known as red date or Chinese date, the fruit of ''Ziziphus jujuba''
Social activity
*Dating, a form of courtship involving social activi ...
that is widely grown in eastern
Saudi Arabia
Saudi Arabia, officially the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), is a country in West Asia. Located in the centre of the Middle East, it covers the bulk of the Arabian Peninsula and has a land area of about , making it the List of Asian countries ...
, the
United Arab Emirates
The United Arab Emirates (UAE), or simply the Emirates, is a country in West Asia, in the Middle East, at the eastern end of the Arabian Peninsula. It is a Federal monarchy, federal elective monarchy made up of Emirates of the United Arab E ...
and the
Persian Gulf
The Persian Gulf, sometimes called the Arabian Gulf, is a Mediterranean seas, mediterranean sea in West Asia. The body of water is an extension of the Arabian Sea and the larger Indian Ocean located between Iran and the Arabian Peninsula.Un ...
region and taking up a large percentage of the farmlands in
Oman
Oman, officially the Sultanate of Oman, is a country located on the southeastern coast of the Arabian Peninsula in West Asia and the Middle East. It shares land borders with Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Yemen. Oman’s coastline ...
and regarded as the original cultivar in the region. One of the most expensive varieties of Emirati date, it has brown skin.
In the Emirates, a major producer of dates globally, researchers have converted khalas date seeds into biofuel. Some million tonnes per annum of date seeds are produced from the UAE's 40 million palms, 10 per cent of which can be extracted as oils. It has been estimated this could create up to 100,000 tonnes of oil for conversion into biofuel. The UAE is the seventh major date producing country in the world, comprising 6% of the world's total date production, with Liwa in the country's western region being a major source of production.
See also
*
List of date cultivars
*
Zahidi (date)
References
Date cultivars
Agriculture in Saudi Arabia
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