India and 4 other South Asian countries set up Asian Palm Oil Alliance (APOA)

Tags: Economy/Finance International News

The five palm oil importing countries of South Asia, India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Nepal have announced the setting up of Asian Palm Oil Alliance (APOA) at Agra, to strengthen their bargaining power and make oil imports sustainable.

IMPORTANT FACTS -

First chairman of the APOA :

• Atul Chaturvedi, President, Solvent Extractors’ Association of India (SEA) has been appointed as the first chairman of the APOA.

Aim of the APOA :

• Elaborating the aim of the APOA, Chaturvedi said that “we aim at safeguarding the economic and business interests of the palm oil consuming countries and will work towards increasing the consumption of palm oil in member countries,” 
• He said that membership of APOA would be further expanded to include companies or industry bodies associated with production or refining of palm oil across the continent.
• The next meeting of the APOA is expected to be held in Indonesia early next year.
• India is the largest importer of palm oil in Asia and in the world , accounting for 15% of global imports, followed by China (9%), Pakistan (4%) and Bangladesh (2%).

Palm Oil and India :  

• Palm oil is used in a wide variety of products from cooking to making shampoos, breads, Ice creams etc.
• India imports about 8.3 million tonnes of palm oil including crude palm oil (CPO), Palmolein and PFAD (Palm Fatty Acid Distillate),
•  Around 4 million tonnes of palm oil comes from Indonesia with Malaysia being the second largest source of palm oil (3.8 million tonnes) and Thailand accounting for the remaining half-a-million tonnes.
• Indonesia and Malaysia jointly produce 84 % of world palm oil.
• The largest producer of palm oil in India is Andhra Pradesh followed by Telangana.