Status report on global Neem usage - Biblioteca Nacional de Portugal

4. NEEM IN DEVELOPMENT-COOPERATION PROJECTS
MYANMAR
Neem is also native to Myanmar (8, 19). And yet, in contrast to India, the tree is neither used
in so many ways nor so intensively in this country. Nevertheless, Myanmar is still exemplary
in its usage of neem due to the commissioning of a neem-extraction plant which was installed
in 1986 at the state’s initiative and a second, which was installed end of the nineties.
Neem pesticides are in great demand with the farmers, as other pesticides are hard to obtain
on the market and neem pesticides sold for the production price. A key reason for Myanmar’s
usage of neem stems from its scarcity of foreign exchange: in short, the less it has to spend
on expensive, synthetic pesticides the better.
Estimated 800 000 neem trees are growing in Myanamar, a further “Motherland” of neem.
"Plant Protection Project"
Time Frame: 1982 - 1993
Short description of the project: Plant protection project within the scope of TC with Myanmar
which installed a pilot plant for the manufacture of a simple, formulated, neem-based
insecticide and disseminated it throughout the country.
Project objective: To manufacture a formulated insecticide (Methanol extraction plant) and
introduce it to vegetable farmers.
Key project activities: Setting up, commissioning and adjustment of a neem-extraction plant
(alcoholic extraction of azadirachtin, the most important insecticidal neem component); field
trials, demonstrations and consultancy inputs; training of technical personnel. The plant is
processing annually about 500 t of neem seed and first steps are taken to extent the production.
The activities were back-stopped by Pesticide Service Project until 2000.
Target group: Farmers and the entire rural population
Political support by the Ministry of Agriculture and by regional and state governments.
Literature:
U AYE KO (1998): Production and Use of Neem Pesticide in Myanmar. In: National Conference
on Biopesticides with emphasis on Neem. GTZ publication 1998, p. 96-102.
NAMIBIA
Some hundred fruitbearing neem trees exist in Namibia, some are even producing seeds
although they are growing on 1200 m altitude.
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