Berita Arkib

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina, Feb 12 (Reuters) - Argentina's 2001/02 soybeancrop is developing well in the main soy-producing regions of the country,but the lack of farm chemicals after last month's public debt default hasleft crops exposed to weeds and pests, the Argentine AgricultureDepartment said Tuesday.Soy plantings were virtually complete with 99.7 percent of the areaforecast to be planted with the oilseed has been sown by Feb 8. "InPergamino (in northwestern Buenos Aires province) where 700,000 hectaresof soy have been planted, the general state of the crop is excellent. Manyinsects are appearing but the biggest problem is the lack of products totreat the crop," the government said in its weekly harvest report.Most fertilizers, pesticides and other farm chemicals are imported intoArgentina, so January's default and subsequent bank restrictions onpayments abroad held up delivery of those goods to the domestic market.The same problem occurred in Cordoba, the main soy producing provincein the current season which accounts for 3.36 million hectares of thetotal national soybean area of 11.3 million hectares. "There are few farmchemicals available and large distributors aren'tselling," the Agriculture Department said.While there are no official soybean production estimates for the 2001/2002crop, local analysts forecast output to reach 30 million tonnes. The U.SDepartment of Agriculture forecast Argentina's soybean production at 28.75million tonnes. Corn plantings were 99.8 percent complete and the crop wasin good condition. Cordoba lead plantings with 754,500 hectares sown.Buenos Aires province was next at 650,500 hectares -- far from the priorcrop year when1.03 million hectares were sown. The smaller planted area in Buenos Aireswas the result of heavy rains late in 2001.USDA forecast Argentina's corn output at 11.5 million tonnes The sunflowerharvest was 14 percent complete out of 2.02 million hectares sown,compared to 1.97 million hectares in the prior crop year. In Buenos Airesprovince, which boasts about 1.06 million hectares, the crop saw lightshowers throughout a windy week. Cotton plantings were 99 percent completeas of the end of the reporting period.Argentina's 2001/02 wheat harvest finished Jan 25 and is widely expectedto yield a 15.7 million tonne crop. Harvesting began on early crops sownin the north, an area that accounts for a small proportion of nationalproduction.

KUALA LUMPUR, Feb 12 (Bernama) -- China's long awaited announcement on itsnew palm oil import quota is expected to improve the current price of thecommodity worldwide.

SEPANG, Feb 12 (Bernama) -- Peat fires, reportedly caused by open burninglast Friday, are threatening to destroy three oil palm plantations nearthe KL International Airport (KLIA) here Tuesday.

JAKARTA, Feb 13 (Reuters) - Indonesia, the world's second largest palm oilproducer, plans to lobby major buyer India next week to lower its heftyimport duty on crude palm oil (CPO), an Indonesian minister said onWednesday.Trade and Industry Minister Rini Soewandi said she will visit India, theworld's largest edible oils importer, on February 19-23 to hold talks withher Indian counterparts and ask them to lower the duties on CPO and itsrefined products by at least 10 percent."Indonesia's CPO is not competitive in India because the import duty ismuch higher than that on soyoil," Soewandi told reporters."So I will ask India to lower their import duty by at least 10 percent,"she said, adding it was impossible to ask India to make the duties on CPOand its refined products on par with those on soyoil.CPO and partially processed crude palm olein carry a tariff of 65 percentin India while its main competition, crude degummed soyoil, is only taxed45 percent.Fully processed palm oil, such as refined, bleached and deodorised (RBD)palm olein, is assessed a duty of 92.4 percent compared with 50.8 percenton refined soyoil.Indonesian traders said some 30 percent of Indonesia's palm oil exports inthe past two years went to India.Indonesia produced more than 8 million tonnes of palm oil in 2001, ofwhich more than 60 percent was exported.

Thursday, February 14, 2002 (The Star) - MALAYSIA is disappointed thatChina failed to honour its promise to announce its import quota for palmoil by last month.Primary Industries Minister Datuk Seri Dr Lim Keng Yaik said China hadcommitted to purchase 2.4 million tonnes of palm oil from theinternational market, compared with 1.4 million tonnes last year,following its entry into the World Trade Organisation (WTO).Malaysia provides about 70% of China’s palm oil requirements.However, he said, the market had waited “week after week” since thebeginning of January for China to announce its import quota, but it wasnot forthcoming.“This has had a dampening effect on the palm oil market. (The Chinese)have to give the quota but they did not, and this is causing worries inthe market,’’ he said.He also said, as this was the Chinese New Year holiday in China, Februarymay pass before the Chinese Government decides on the quota.Lim also said although China was now a member of the WTO, it still did notpractice the free market system.It was imposing restrictions, including controlling the import of palm oilwith the quota.“If they do announce the quota, I hope it is not with conditions,’’ hetold reporters at Parti Gerakan’s Chinese New Year open house at the party’s headquarters in Kuala Lumpur on Tuesday.Apart from the import quota, he said, another barrier to palm oilexporters was getting China to provide foreign exchange for its importers,who were mostly state enterprises.“They may give the quota to the state enterprises but if they do notprovide foreign exchange – China has US$145bil in foreign reserves – wewill have another barrier,’’ he said, adding that he may have to go on aworking visit to China soon to sort out the problem.Lim said International Trade and Industry Minister Datuk Seri Rafidah Azizwould write to China’s Minister of Foreign Economic Trade Relationshipwhile he (Lim) would write to China’s Minister of Economic PlanningCommission to ask the Chinese Government to announce the quota.He also said that apart from China, India (as the other top two consumersof palm oil) was also causing a dampening effect on the price of palm oilin the commodity exchange.The price of palm oil should be at RM1,250 per tonne by the end of thisyear but the current price was already down to RM1,050 per tonne, Limsaid.This, he said, was also due to India’s “discriminating import tariff.”Although India had reduced import tariff on crude palm oil from 70% to65%, it was still discriminatory compared with the 45% tariff on soya oil,he said.The difference between import tariffs for processed palm oil and palmolein and soya oil was even greater – 98% (including value added tax) forthe former compared with 50% for the latter, Lim said.“I have written to the Indian government hoping for it to review the taxat the end of February when the government reveals its tax structure,’’Lim said.He also said the Indian government could continue to raise the tariff toprotect its farmers.However, Malaysia wanted India to narrow the difference in the tariffstructure between palm oil and soya oil.Palm oil and soya oil are the two main oils imported by India.“We also suggested some mechanism to put the tariff on palm oil and soyaoil at the same level,’’ Lim said.According to Lim, the unfair distribution, tariff imposition, andimplementation of the quota system by China and India had caused adisruption in the international palm oil market.

KUALA LUMPUR, Feb 12 (Bernama) -- The Malaysian Trades Union Congress(MTUC) today lauded the MIC President's proposal that monthly wages beinstituted for estate labourers.

LUMUT, Feb 8 (Bernama) -- Port operator, Lumut Maritime Terminal Sdn Bhd,(LMT) expects its five year old port in Lumut, Perak to see throughputgrowing at 20 percent a year over the next five years, its chief executiveoffice Harun Halim Rasip said.

SHAH ALAM, Feb 7 (Bernama) -- A Malaysian innovator-turn technopreneuroffers a new service to industries wanting their industrial material toundergo a strength test according to their needs and requirements.

8/2/2002 (Business Times) - THE soyabean producers took on the palm oilindustry a while back, and there was nothing gentlemanly about thecampaign too, the sole objective being to defend its share of the globaledible oils market.It was a bruising battle but palm oil ultimately triumphed as claims bythe soyabean lobby that the commodity of which Malaysia is the biggestproducer was unhealthy quickly proved to the contrary.Indeed the smear tactics backfired and palm oil became even more popularamong the world’s increasingly health-conscious consumers, ironicallythanks in part to the publicity generated.This was in the late-1980s. Now it looks like a new challenger is climbinginto the ring; not quite a heavyweight like soyabean, but one which couldnevertheless still put palm oil to the test.It has emerged that the tallow industry, a relatively minor player in theglobal edible oils and fats trade, is leading the fresh attack.Tallow is mostly produced from the suet of sheep or cattle, and containsstearin, palmitin and olein that can be used to make candles and soap.According to Malaysian Palm Oil Promotion Council market promotionsdirector Dr Ahmad Ibrahim, the council had been alerted to a disturbingincident at a recent oleochemical conference in Amsterdam.A speaker who represents an Australian oleochemical company toldparticipants that oil palm cultivation was destroying the environment.In the presentation, it was claimed that the activity was bad news for theenvironment because of the excessive use of fertilisers, pesticides andherbicides which contributes to loss of biodiversity.The speaker also alleged that massive regions of rainforests had beencleared in Indonesia to plant oil palm.In truth, of all the edible oils crops, studies have shown that oil palmcultivation poses the least threat to the environment, Ahmad said.For one thing, it is a crop which depends very little on inorganicfertilisers and herbicides compared to its rivals, he said in his columnfor Business Times.In addition, Malaysia has progressive plantation companies, with GoldenHope, forexample, having even won the prestigious UN Global 500 award forthe zero-burning technique it introduced to the industry, Ahmad said.The fact is the tallow industry has been feeling the impact of a falloutfrom the mad cow disease epidemic in Europe, which conversely benefitedthe palm oil industry.The mad cow disease scare has prompted the European Union to ban animalfeed derived from animal fats, and that includes tallow.“The EU’s import of palm stearin rose almost immediately after therestriction was put in place.”It looks like the desperate effort to smear palm oil is the direct resultof that, and given consumers’ growing concern over the environment, thethreat of rainforest and biodiversity degradation is a convenient tack, hesaid.Animal fats were already experiencing a downtrend in trade and consumptionbefore now, largely on account of their negative nutritional value, butalso because of religious taboos, Ahmad noted.Today, very little of the world tallow output is eaten, mostly being usedto make soap or processed into oleochemicals and their derivatives, headded.World production of tallow now total just above 8 million tonnes a year,compared to palm oil’s well 20 million tonnes.Malaysia alone produces over 11 million tonnes of palm oil annually.The US is the main source of the world’s tallow, accounting for close to48 per cent.The EU is a distant second with under 13 per cent.Australia, with a 6 per cent share, is however the biggest exporter of thecommodity after the US. In 2000, the US exported slightly more than 1million tonnes, and Australia about half that, which makes the latter theworld leader in the sector in terms of export per unit production.

MUMBAI, Feb. 4. (Business Line) - SERIOUS malpractices in the import ofvegetable oils including misuse of concessional duty and misdeclaration ofoil to avail of lower duty need to be checked with effective rules to plugpossible loopholes, a Kolkata-based trade association has urged.In a representation to the Central Board of Excise and Customs, Mr RajuMansinghka, President of the All-India Oils and Seeds Foreign TradeAssociation, has pointed out that fatty acid distillate is mixed withrefined oil and declared as crude oil in order to avail of lower customsduty on the latter.In order to address the issue which has serious health implication, theassociation has suggested a stipulation of minimum of 3 per cent freefatty acid content for crude oils of palm group or reduction of the dutydifferential between crude and refined oils to 15 percentage points.In the guise of vanaspati imports from Nepal, a lot of refined liquid oil(refined palm oil) is flowing into the country, the trade body hasalleged, adding that though declared as vanaspati, such oil is neitherhydrogenated nor is sesame oil used as tracer.The association has recommended that restricting vanaspati imports fromNepal through only two or three customs borders and testing of samples forquality by the customs and Government food laboratories would help preventmalpractice and reduce distortions in the market.

DUBAI, Feb 6 (Bernama) -- Malaysia is looking at new ways to boost palmoil exports to Gulf Arab countries, a senior Malaysian Palm Oil Board(MPOB) official said here on Tuesday.

KUALA LUMPUR, Wed. 7 February, 2002 (NSTP) — Rubber smallholders will bediscouraged from replanting their land with oil palm in a bid to ensurethere is sufficient latex for downstream activities in the country andthose who insist on doing so will lose the government subsidy.