Manufacture of salvia essential oil
Karina-Agro Ltd. manufactures essential oil from Salvia (Clargy Sage) in its own essential oils distillation plant. The entire process of crop cultivation and raw material processing is fully automated from the harvesting of the plants to the extraction of the essential oil using high-performance machines.
Salvia is a relatively new crop for the manufacture of essential oil in our country. Its inflorescences contain about 0.15% of essential oil, which is widely used in perfumery, cosmetics and soap production for flavoring. The essential oil has a fine aroma, fixing property and also easily dissolves in ethyl spirit. These properties make salvia particularly suitable for eliminating essence deficiencies.
The salvia essential oil can also be used as a spice in the confectionery and liqueur industry, such as an ingredient in the manufacture of vermouth, etc.
Salvia seeds contain 31.02% of high quality plain oil.
Salvia is native to Mediterranean countries of South Europe (France, Italy, Spain). The medicinal plant is found also in Bulgaria, Romania and Crimea.
Salvia is a perennial herbaceous plant. Its root system is highly developed and consists of a perennial spindle-shaped root up to 1.5 m deep, and thick lateral roots. The strong root system and the structure of the stems determine the particular drought-resistance feature of this plant species.
The stems are square and annual. They rise up to a height of 2 m, they are 2 cm thick and densely covered with glandular hairs. At the top they carry large inflorescences.
The leaves are large, arranged opposite each other. They are oblong ovate, often heart-shaped. The lower rosette-like leaves have long petioles, the upper ones are sitting. The leaves are finely wavy, covered with multiple silvery hairs that give them soft, silvery gloss.
The panicle-shaped inflorescences are highly branched and up to 29-50 cm long. The flowers are arranged like a ring along the branches of inflorescences.
The essential oil is a colorless or slightly yellowish liquid of specific and pleasant orange-like odor. It contains mainly composite esters, linalyl acetate in the first place, in quantity of 50-78%. In addition, salvia essential oil contains also linalool, geraniol, nerol, sclareol, the sesquiterpene nerolidol, free formic acid and other unsaturated acids.
