16/11/2013 (Reuters) - Malaysia, the world's No.2 palm oil producer, has set its crude palm oil export tax for December at 5.0 percent, a government circular showed on Friday -- the first hike after nine months.

The rate had been left unchanged at 4.5 percent since March.

The Southeast Asian country calculated a reference price of 2,452.43 ringgit ($770) per tonne for crude palm oil for December, effectively raising the export duty to 5.0 percent. ($1 = 3.2055 Malaysian ringgit)