KUALA LUMPUR, Dec 3 (Reuters) - Malaysia's crude palm oil futures are setto rebound to four-month highs at 1,300 ringgit or $342 a tonne in thefirst quarter of 2002 on tight soyoil supplies and steady demand frommajor buyers such as India, a leading Indian trader said."CPO index will definitely go to 1,300 ringgit and remain there. It shouldgo there very quickly," Dorab Mistry, director of Godrej InternationalLtd, told Reuters in an interview at the weekend.Malaysia's crude palm oil futures touched 1,613 ringgit ($424.47) a tonne(third-month basis) in May 9, 1999. By midday on Monday, benchmarkthird-month February contract firmed 28 ringgit to 1,125 ($296.1) tonne.Volume was slow at 959 lots.Another bullish factor will be China, which is expected to import 2.4million tonnes of palm oil in 2002 at low tariffs under atariff-rate-quota system following its entry to the World TradeOrganisation (WTO), Mistry said.China's palm oil imports quotas stood at 1.4 million tonnes this year. Itbought 1.02 million tonnes of palm oil from Malaysia in 2000, up from800,135 tonnes in 1999."They will utilise the palm oil quota first. In that case if the Chinesebegin to buy palm oil, we could go to 1,600 ($421.11) ringgit," saidMistry, who was in Malaysia for an industry talk.Mistry said China was likely to use its soyoil import quotas when prices,now at premiums of around $20-$30/tonne to palmoil, softened in April withthe start of South American soybean crop."Between now and the South American season which starts in April, palm oilhas very little competition. But (it) will remain the case if palm oilremains at $20-$30 discount to bean oil FOB," he added.

INDIA'S IMPORTS MAY RISE

Mistry said India, the world's largest edible oil importer, was projectedto import at least 5.1 million tonnes of edible oil in the year to October2002, unchanged from 2000/2001. Imports stood at 4.8 million tonnes in1999/2000.But a decline in India's domestic rapeseed production, seen at 4.5 milliontonnes next year compared with a normal five million tonnes, could furtherboost purchases."If you take that (declines) as a given factor, then India's imports couldbe even 5.5 million tonnes (2001/2002)," said Mistry.The breakdown, he said, would be 1.0 million to 1.2 million tonnes ofsoyoil, about 100,000 tonnes of coconut and palm kernel oil, 100,000tonnes of sunflower oil and around 4.0 million to 4.1 million tonnes ofpalm oil.Malaysia exported 2.03 million tonnes of palm oil to India in 2000, downfrom 2.38 million tonnes in 1999.Mistry said the Malaysian Palm Oil Association (MPOA) estimated output inthe world's largest palm oil producer to ease to 11.5 million tonnes in2002, which would give the market more reasons to move up.Influential private forecaster Ivan Wong estimated Malaysia's palm oiloutput to reach 11.65 million tonnes this year, up from 10.84 million in2000.The world's second largest producer, Indonesia, which usually sellspalmoil at a $5/tonne discount and whose output is set to rise to eightmillion tonnes in 2001 from last year's 6.5 million, is no longer abearish factor for Malaysia, Mistry said."Shipping out of Indonesia is very nightmarish because of the congestionat the ports, the difficulties and all that. I think Malaysia andIndonesia are quite competitively based," he said."Bear in mind, if the index futures go to 1,300 ringgit and there's alittle weakness in the rupiah, the Indonesian government will be forced toraise the export duties in order to protect its own consumers.," he added.Indonesia's CPO export tax stands at three percent. The duty is at onepercent for crude olein, RBD palm oil and RBD palm olein. ($1=3.8 ringgit)