Cultivation of date palms in Egypt goes back thousands of years. The date palm tree has great socioeconomic importance and nutritional value in Egypt. Its traditional use as a primary source of food and by-products and its ecological benefi ts in oasis agriculture make it an important fruit tree and the best crop to be cultivated. Egypt is the most productive country of date palm fruit in the world. There is a high potential for increasing the production area of date palm to fulfi ll local consumption in the whole country and to produce date fruits for export purposes. Presently, the Egyptian Government and private sector are convinced of the potential of date production and are striving to establish commercial date plantations and promote viable date production. Despite its important roles in Egyptian agriculture and the efforts made, date palm cultivation, production, processing, and marketing are still beleaguered with several problems. The low quality of cultivars, poor farm management, pests and diseases, marketing obstacles, and insuffi cient applicable research are the major constraints of the date palm in Egypt. Moreover, inconsistent quality in combination with low-grade packaging provides a considerable challenge for Egyptian date producers to fi ll the unmet domestic and international demand. By contrast, an abundance of capable manpower and arable land, low labor costs as well as the wide range of date palm diversity are among the most important competitive factors. This chapter discusses the current status, constraints, and the available avenues that can be used to develop the date palm industry in Egypt.

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Date palms (Phoenix dactylifera L.) are important traditional crop, vital component of human diet in the Arab world. It has essential nutrients i.e. (vitamins, minerals, dietary fibers and carbohydrates) and potential health benefits. Date fruit was oven dried and milled. This study aims to evaluate the effect of date powder as a natural sweetener instead of sugar on the proximate chemical composition, physical properties and sensory characterizations of cookies. However, levels of replacement of Samany date powder which used in the cookies formula were 5, 10, 20 and 40%. Proximate chemical composition of Samany date were determined .It was noticed that the moisture percentage was of 54.74%, while the protein and fat contents were found at low levels being 1.61 and 0.77%, respectively. The ash and crude fiber were constituted 2.36 and 6.51%, respectively. Total sugars were obtained at 47.27%, however, reducing and nonreducing sugar were given at 35.40 and 11.87%, respectively. The obtained results showed that increasing the date powder ratio led to increase total carbohydrates, crude fibers, ash, crude fat, moisture and protein contents. However, physical characteristics of cookies, i.e. thickness, diameter and speed factor of the prepared cookies decreased. The results of organoleptic criteria indicated that color had low score with increasing the substitution ratio. On the other hand, both crispiness and texture were affected at 20% and 40% of date powder level. Our findings ascertained that the cookies supplemental with 40% date powder had the lowest acceptability. Meanwhile, at substitution ratio of 10%, the quality of cookies was not adversely affected by the color, taste, crispiness, texture, odor and overall acceptability (p ≥0.05), so, it could be suggesting that date palm powder can be used and incorporated in bakery products up to 10% .Finally, it can be concluded that it is highly recommended to use dates powder in the manufacturing of cookies at a commercial scale where the nutritional value of the samples increased by increasing the replacement of date powder.

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Date palm, Phoenix dactylifera, as one of the most important fruit crops in Egypt and many other countries, can be affected by many fungal diseases, among which the vascular wilt disease, caused by the fungal pathogen Fusarium oxysporum, is considered the most deteriorating one. This study aims at evaluating the efficiency of Copper-Chitosan Nanopcomposition for treating the vascular wilt disease in date palm. The study relies mainly on beleaguering the disease via the doublerole functionality of copper-chitosan nanocomposition, i.e. its potential antifungal effect on the fungal pathogen, besides its capability to enhance the immune responses of the infected plant. In this regard, chitosan nanoparticles were prepared according to the ionic gelation method, whereas copper nanoparticles were prepared according to the chemical reduction method. Physicochemical characterization of both chitosan and copper nanoparticles was performed using dynamic light scattering (DLS), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) and x-ray diffraction (XRD).Copper-chitosan nanocomposition could significantly reduce the vascular wilt disease severity; this means that the nanocomposition can be used in the future for developing new nanofungicides to control such pathogens.

This trial was conducted during 2015 and 2016 seasons to found the best time of pollination of Saidy date palms grown under New Valley conditions. Pollination was done by spraying pollen grains suspension (5 g pollens/L water). Selecting the optimum period at which the female flowers of such date palm cv. remain receptive for pollination is very essential for date palm growers. Pollination was carried out on zero, two, four, six, eight and ten days from female cracking, besides the traditional pollination (seven strands / spathe). The date reveals that the time of pollination had an obvious impact on fruit retention%, yield and quality of Saidy date palms fruits. Traditional pollination with seven strands / spathe surpassed the pollination with improving grain suspension on product fruit retention %, yield and bunch weight. Fruit quality was greatly enhanced with pollination using pollen grain suspension over carrying out traditional pollination. Delaying times of pollination from zero to four days after spathe cracking caused a gradual promotion on fruit retention, yield and bunch weight. A gradual reduction on these parameters was observed with delaying times of pollination from 4-10 days after spathe cracking. Delaying times of pollination from 0-10 days after spathe cracking caused a progressive promotion on all physical and chemical characteristics of the fruits. Carrying out pollination with pollen grain suspension (5 g/ 1 L W) at two to four days after spathe cracking is considered the striking period of pistil receptivity and at the same time was necessary to produce appropriate yield and fair fruit quality of Saidy date palms grown under New Valley conditions,