POLLEN introduction and exchange have been suggested as a means of broadening the scope of breeding programmes designed to produce disease-resistant and high-yielding coconuts1–3; and at a recent meeting of the Food and Agriculture Organization Technical Working Party on Coconut Production it was stressed4 that the most important material question to be solved concerned the mode of transportation of pollen. It is clear that present methods of storage of coconut pollen5–8, though useful, are inconvenient for routine pollen exchanges over long distances.