14/04/2008 (Bernama), Kota Kinabalu - Malaysia is not concerned over the issue of who will be the world's biggest palm oil producer as the country prefers to place extra focus on palm oil that is sustainably produced, a Malaysian palm oil official said Monday.

He said this is because Malaysia wants to produce palm oil that is in line with the preservation of biodiversity and the environment.

"We do not aspire to be the No 1 all the time," the chief executive officer of the Malaysian Palm Oil Council (MPOC), Tan Sri Dr Yusof Basiron, said.

"We accept the reality that Indonesia is catching up because it has plenty of land (for the cultivation of oil palm) compared to us.

"But what we want to do is make sure that we are producing the oil from sources with sustainable practices in our plantations and mills," he told reporters at the International Palm Oil Sustainability Conference (IPOSC) 2008 here.

Dr Yusof said this when asked to comment on how long Malaysia can remain as the world's biggest palm oil producer as Indonesia seems to be catching up.

The palm oil industry faces severe criticism from environmental groups which are concerned about climate change, loss of biodiversity and environmental degradation.

Environmental activists, such as those in Europe and the United States, have a massive campaign alleging that Malaysia and Indonesia, the world's top producers of palm oil, are destroying the environment and the orang utan's natural habitat with the opening of oil palm estates, with some groups even claiming that biodiesel derived from palm oil is not a clean fuel.

These groups claim that the expansion of oil palm cultivation may not only increase gas emission but also destroy the natural habitats of wildlife.

Palm oil importing countries, especially those in the West, now insist on some form of assurance that the palm oil they import comes from sources with sustainable practices in the plantations and mills.

Europe lately has emerged as one of the major markets for palm oil - apart from China and India - given the increasing demand for biofuel, with estimates that the European market will import 30 million tonnes of palm oil by 2010 for biodiesel production.

-- BERNAMA