Archived News

FAISALABAD (April 06 2003) : Trading Corporation of Pakistan (TCP) willauction 10,000 metric tonnes of soyabean oil imported from USA under 416(b) programmes

SAO PAULO (April 05 2003) : Brazil's March soyabean exports rose 111percent to 1.31 million tonnes from the same month last year, the TradeMinistry's foreign trade secretariat (Secex) said Friday.

KARACHI (April 07 2003) - Sindh Minister for Planning and Development SyedShoaib Ahmed Bukhari has instructed Department of Agriculture and Planning& Development that a master plan be prepared for the cultivation ofcoconut and oil palm in the coastal areas of Sindh so that valuableforeign exchange being spent on import of edible oils could be saved.

NEW DELHI (April 05 2003) : India on Friday forecast a lower oilseeds andfood-grains output in 2002-03 after the country was hit by its worstdrought in 15 years following the failure of monsoon rains.

JAKARTA (April 05 2003) : Indonesia's East Kalimantan province plans toplant one million hectares of palm oil near the border of rival producerMalaysia, a senior official from the ministry of Eastern Indonesiadevelopment said on Friday.

Tuesday, April 01, 2003 (The star) - PRIMARY Industries Minister DatukSeri Dr Lim Keng Yaik has advised those in the palm oil industry tominimise risk by devoting 10% to 20% of their land to planting rubbertrees.He was quoted by China Press as saying that the cyclical pattern ofcommodity prices made it necessary for planters to spread the risk bygrowing several types of crops.He said he was disappointed that his earlier advice had not been heeded bythe industry and this had led to the wholesale conversion of the country’srubber estates into oil palm plantations, reported the daily.He reminded oil palm plantations of the painful experience two years agowhen palm oil prices fell to an all-time low.“Palm oil prices fell as low as RM700 a tonne before climbing to RM1,300last year and RM1,600 this year,” he said.According to Dr Lim, the country’s 3.6 million hectares of oil palmplantations provided 315,000 jobs and earned the country RM28.3bil.Sin Chew Daily carried an article on Works Minister Datuk Seri S. SamyVellu saying he had instructed PLUS to immediately call off an operationto flag down lorries suspected of not paying toll.Perak state executive councillor Datuk Ong Ka Chuan said Samy Vellu hadconveyed this instruction to the PLUS chairman at a highway upgradingproject ceremony in Lumut on Saturday, said the paper.Nanyang Siang Pau carried an article quoting MCA president Datuk Seri DrLing Liong Sik as saying that following the Perak government's show ofsupport for Universiti Tunku Abdul Rahman, another state had offered 810hato the university.Dr Ling did not name the state but said he would disclose the matter whendetails on the donation had been worked out, the daily said.He said in Sungai Siput on Sunday that Utar received overwhelming supportfrom the Chinese, Malay and Indian communities and the Government.He said the 525ha allocated by Perak for a premium of RM800,000, theRM50mil launching grant for the university approved by Prime MinisterDatuk Seri Dr Mahathir Mohamad and the land offer by Johor were clearsigns of public support for the university.

Sunday, March 30, 2003 (GENEVA): The man leading negotiations on reducingbarriers to international trade in agriculture acknowledged Friday that itwill be impossible to meet next week’s deadline to set the framework forcuts because of intractable national positions.Stuart Harbinson told the 145-nation World Trade Organisation thatcountries need to come up with new proposals and compromises.The blueprint is supposed to be agreed on March 31, but negotiators nowfear the talking could continue for months.An agreement on agriculture is seen by many as the key to a wider round oftrade liberalisation negotiations that are supposed to be completed by theend of next year. Already the WTO has missed a number of deadlines, butthis failure would be the biggest so far.US chief negotiator Allen Johnson this week claimed the problems werecaused by “the European Union's inability to engage and Japan'sunwillingness to engage.'' Those countries insist the talks must takeaccount of the fact that some subsidies are needed to ensureself-sufficiency, consumer protection and animal welfare standards.But EU negotiator Mary Minch denied that the 15-nation bloc is laggingbehind and said some countries were demanding a lot from the EU withoutoffering anything in return.“We feel that we have put forward an ambitious and balanced proposal whichwill move reform ahead in all the areas,’’ she said.Countries have been making proposals for months on how to reduce importtariffs on agricultural goods and cut back on subsidies paid to farmers,but they disagree widely on which areas to tackle and how far to go.While some nations – mostly large, agricultural exporting countries likeAustralia, the United States and Brazil – want to see major cuts,importers like the European Union and Japan have lesser ambitions.Some developing countries, including India, say they need to see big cutsto subsidies paid by rich nations before they would consider reducingimport duties.Harbinson, who chairs the WTO committee negotiating on agriculture,produced a proposal for the agreement in February which called for importtariffs to be cut by up to 60%.It also proposed the elimination of all subsidies linked to exports withinnine years and drastic cuts to other subsidies. But the Harbinson plan wasroundly criticised from all sides.If agriculture discussions overrun, that could slow the progress in theWTO’s other areas of negotiation, such as trade in manufactured goods andtrade in services like banking and telecommunications. – AP

3/27/2003 - Palm oil prices are expected to suffer a further set back thisseason, as its exports to the Middle East and European countries have beenhit by the Iraq war.

Chemical Market Reporter, March 17 2003

BUENOS AIRES (March 29 2003) : Rains that hit Argentina's main soyaregions on Friday were not expected to delay the record harvest in theworld's No 3 producer because warm weather will allow farmers to re-enterthe fields in short order, a government weather specialist said.

ROME (March 29 2003) : The UN World Food Programme (WFP) will spend fundsraised from a planned appeal for over $1 billion for Iraq on vitalfoodstuffs including wheat flour, rice and cooking oil, its chiefspokesman said on Friday.

BOMBAY (March 27 2003) : India, the world's largest edible oil importer,has increased palm oil buying for April arrival cargoes but is avoidingsigning long-term contracts on concerns the war in Iraq could beprolonged.