New Delhi, Jan 12 (PTI) Palm oil imports remained flat at7,22,857 tonne in December because of increase in the importduty, industry body Solvent Extractors Association (SEA) saidtoday.
India, the world's leading vegetable oil buyer, hadimported 7,23,158 tonne palm oil in December 2016.
The country's total vegetable oil imports declined 10per cent to 10,88,783 tonne in December 2017 compared to12,09,685 tonne in the year-ago period.
The share of palm oil is more than 60 per cent of thecountry's total vegetable oil imports.
In November, the government raised the import duty onedible oils by 12.5 per cent to 15 per cent across the boardto ensure farmers get remunerative prices for their produce.
"This announcement has changed the sentiment and themarket has moved upward and now prices of soyabean andgroundnut are above the minimum support price," the SEA saidin a statement.
The second objective of the hike in import duty was tooffset the export duty imposed by palm oil exporting countriesespecially Malaysia and Indonesia, it said.
SEA said the increase in import duty by India led toMalaysia suspending the export taxes on crude palm oil (CPO)for a three-month period effective January 8, 2018, and withthis export duty on CPO will be nil.
"The withdrawal of export duty by Malaysia on CPO willreduce the landed cost and thereby India would be benefited,"it added.
Among palm oil products, import of CPO increased to6,08,405 tonne in December 2017 from 4,73,179 tonne in theyear-ago period, as per the SEA data.
The shipment of crude palm kernel oil (CPKO) alsoincreased to 7,528 tonne from 4,425 tonne, while that of RBDpalmolein declined to 1,06,924 tonne from 2,45,554 tonne inthe said period.
Among soft oil, import of sunflower oil increased to2,36,655 tonne in December 2017 from 1,85,824 tonne in theyear-ago period.
The shipment of soyabean oil fell sharply to 79,250 tonnefrom 2,32,132 tonne, while that of rapeseed-mustard oildeclined to 19,527 tonne from 22,138 tonne in the said period.
India imports palm oil mainly from Indonesia andMalaysia, and a small quantity of crude soft oil, includingsoyabean oil from Latin America. Sunflower oil is importedfrom Ukraine and Russia. PTI LUXANU.
This is unedited, unformatted feed from the Press Trust of India wire.