IPOH, Nov 30 (NSTP): Felcra hopes to capture a slice of the the MiddleEast and African market by opening a palm oil refinery in Oman on ajoint-venture basis with a local company soon.Its chairman Datuk Hamzah Zainuddin said the refinery would be the firstto be set up by Felcra."It will be carried out jointly with a reputable public-listed company inthe Sultanate, he said yesterday.The Finance Ministry had given its approval and an agreement is expectedto be signed mid next month.Felcra will hold a 49 per cent stake in the project with an investment ofRM7.5 million, with the remaining stake be held by the Oman company.The total cost of the refinery is about RM100 million, 80 per cent to befinanced by Oman banks.Present was Perak Felcra regional manager Jahare Abu Bakar.Hamzah said the construction of the refinery would begin soon, and wouldbe completed by early 2004. The refinery would largely be managed byMalaysian personnel as Oman did not have the expertise, and would processcrude palm oil imported from Felcra's 150,000 hectares of plantations inMalaysia.The refinery would be located near Port Salalah to enable the palm oil tobe exported to countries like Yemen, United Arab Emirates (UAE), Dubai andQatar.Felcra is also studying the possibility of downstream activities in India,which is a major importer of the commodity.In Kuching, Felcra brought early Hari Raya cheer to 2,636 participants ofits land schemes in Sarawak, by paying them dividends averaging RM600 eachParliamentary secretary to the Rural Development Ministry Datin PadukaRohani Abdul Karim said the total dividends given out this year in theState was RM1.56 million."On the average, each participant gets RM600, but there is one participantis getting RM33,975 as his farm of 13 hectares was well managed," shesaid.Present was Felcra's general manager Juzilman Basir."Palm oil prices this year is good, and is expected to remain at the samelevel next year, Rohani saidShe also said Felcra does not focus its attention solely on plantationdevelopment, but also provided facilities such as skills developmenttraining and infrastructure development in its areas.Juzilman said dividends totalling RM84.8 million would be distributed tothe 77,000 land scheme participants nationwide this year.