17/05/2016 (Bernama) - The Malaysian Palm Oil Council (MPOC) has rebuffed claims associating Malaysian oil palm plantation with excessive land usage and deforestation.

Chief executive officer Tan Sri Dr Yusof Basiron said Malaysia's agricultural land constituted about 25 per cent of the total land in the country, including 15 per cent planted with oil palm trees, while forest areas made up 62 per cent of the total land.

"Oil palm is cultivated on legitimate agricultural land whereby not many countries have very low usage of land for agriculture such as Malaysia.

"Furthermore, we promise the world that we keep at least 50 per cent forest coverage in our country. So, this allegation of oil palm associated with deforestation does not apply to Malaysian oil palm," he told reporters after the launch of Malaysia-Turkey Palm Oil Seminar here, today.

He said on the global scale, the world's oil palm plantation only occupied 0.31 per cent of the total five billion hectares of land used for agriculture but contributed about 30 per cent of global edible oil supply, making it the largest consumed vegetable oil.

"It is producing so much oil with so little land. We can produce up to 25 times more oil per hectare annually compared to soya, rapeseed or sunflower with the new research material currently being implemented on the field.

"The yield increment potential will help us supply the world's need without venturing into opening up more forest land and so on," he added.

Meanwhile, MPOC Chairman Datuk Lee Yeow Chor said Malaysia had a very strict forest land usage policy as the country was very committed to preserving its forests.

Going forward, he said industry players were looking at replanting existing agricultural land not planted with oil palm trees into oil palm plantation for expansion, as well as putting more emphasis on improving the palm oil yield on existing land.

Co-organised by MPOC and the Malaysian Palm Oil Board, the seminar covers various issues relating to the palm oil industry including recent application developments, innovations, nutrition and market updates.

It also provides the platform for oil and fats business players to meet and explore business opportunities and trade partnership, as well as bringing together new buyers and sellers to further enhance palm oil trade between the two countries.