NEW DELHI, May 16 (Reuters) - India announced on Thursday that it hadraised the base import price of crude palm oil to $344 from $314 a tonne.India, the world's largest edible oil importer, mainly buys palm oilfrom Malaysia and Indonesia and soybean oil from Argentina and Brazil.It said in a notification that the base import price of refined,bleached and deodorised (RBD) palm oil had also been hiked to $365 from$341 per tonne.The government raised the base price of RBD palm olein to $375 a tonnefrom $349.It fixed the price of crude palm olein at $362 a tonne from theprevious $334.The government had left the base import prices unchanged in an earliernotification issued early May.India fixes the base prices to check loss of revenue due tounder-invoicing by some importers.Traders pay import duties on tariff values fixed by the governmentirrespective of the price at which they purchase oils.The country imposes a basic import levy of 85 percent on refined oil,65 percent on CPO and 45 percent on soybean oil.

(The informations and opinions expressed in this article represent theviews of the author only. They should not be seen as necessarilyreflecting the views of Palm News)