KARACHI (January 13 2005): Pakistan's edible oil imports remained slowover the past week due to high domestic cottonseed availability, anddealers said on Wednesday they would remain low in the near term. "Theprices are going down due to the high domestic cottonseed supplies, whichare just going on and on," said Akber Puri, a dealer in the southern portcity of Karachi. "Local cottonseed is a much cheaper option as compared toimported oil, thus the imports are also slow," he said.

Pakistan expects output of cottonseed to cross 580,000 tonnes this season,up from the previous year's 400,000 on the back of a big cotton crop in2004/05 (April-February).

Domestic cottonseed is one of Pakistan's major sources of vegetable oil.It is mixed or blended with palm oil and soyoil.

Dealers reported around 100,000 tonnes of palm oil and palm olein stocksavailable in the market and another 45,000 tonnes were expected to arrivein coming weeks - sufficient to meet local demand.

Puri said international edible oil prices looked attractive, which mightresult in import orders in the coming weeks.

Pakistan imports about 800,000 tonnes of oilseeds and about 1.3 milliontonnes of edible oil products annually, led by palm oil and palm olein.Its annual demand is 1.9 million tonnes.

Courtesy Business Recorder