Various chemical induction techniques using phytohormones, salts, methyl jasmonate, soybean oil, brown sugar, formic acid, hydrogen peroxide, salicylic acid, and other substances have been employed to prompt trees to produce agarwood. Chemical induction is less time-consuming than inoculation because fewer treatment sites are needed, and the inducers are delivered throughout the tree via its transpiration process. A study by Liu et al. (2013) indicated that agarwood produced via chemical induction was similar in quality to natural agarwood and that yield was substantially higher than from inoculation.
The ‘‘Whole-tree Agarwood-Inducing Technique’’ (Agar-Wit) is a commercial product for producing agarwood using chemical induction that is used in China. Other such commercial kits include Ca-Kit and Agar-Bit (the latter combining chemical induction and wounding) that contain an inoculant for injection. The Ca-Kit indicates that users can expect an increase of 30% over natural levels of agar production, but India reported that they had no success with this method. Similarly, chemical inoculation in the Lao People’s Democratic Republic has not been successful. It appears that only China, some plantations in Bangladesh, and a single plantation in Cambodia are using the chemical induction technique, with all others using various combinations of fungal inoculants.