Biodiversity Makes Scents - Essential Oil Project

Biodiversity can generate a wide range of interesting natural ingredients for the development of commercially health and personal care products. Some plants produce volatile and fragrant substances that generally aromatic and possess pleasant odour and essence. Many of these plants have traditionally been used in medicines, as fragrances and flavours for food.

In 2006 the Sarawak Biodiversity Centre (SBC) started a project called "Development of Medicinal and Aromatic Oils from Sarawak's Indigenous Plants". The aim of this project is to inventorise, analyse and develop the medicinal and aromatic oils from Sarawak's biodiversity.

The goal of the project is to discover useful essential oils that have market potential and to create a value chain from the supply of raw materials to the production of healthcare and medicinal products with the benefits going back to the communities that have shared information on the plants that they use.

To date, SBC has collected and analysed more than 100 different types of essential oils. SBC is exploring partnership with multinational companies to evaluate their potential for healthcare, fragrances, and flavours.

LitSara® oil produces a strong, crisp scent with citrus-lemony notes (D-limonene and citronellal).

Essential oil of AdenoSara® from Borneo offers a woody and a herbal scent that is reminiscent of oregano.