Incense Resin from Halmaddi

Halmaddi is the Indian name for both the evergreen rainforest tree Ailanthus triphysa, also called ferntop ash, and the resin it yields. The tree grows up to 30 metres with a straight cylindrical trunk and rough grey bark, and it has greenish-yellow flowers. It occurs from India and Sri Lanka through Southeast Asia and into northern Australia. Its wood is used for matchwood and plywood. When the bark is cut, a sticky resin is exuded that becomes brittle on drying, and because of its fixative properties it may be used as an ingredient in incense sticks. The page says that in Cambodia the resin is also used as incense. It says crude extraction methods killed trees, so by the 1990s the Forest Department in India had banned resin extraction, which raised the price of halmaddi and reduced its use in incense.