India's vegetable oil imports in the current oil year ending September 2011 is likely to remain stable at last year's level of 9.24 million tonnes (MT) on increased oilseeds output, Solvent Extractors' Association (SEA) has said.
"Vegetable oil import is likely to be of the same level during the current oil year as additional production will take care of incremental demand," SEA Executive Director B V Mehta said.
During the 2009-10 oil year, India had imported 9.241 MT vegetable oil, up by 70 per cent from 5.39 MT in 2005-06.
Out of the total projected vegetable oil imports in the current oil year, edible oil would be 8.82 MT and the rest is non-edible oils.
Of the total edible oil imports, crude palm oil would be 5.3 million tonnes (against 5.17 MT in 2009-10) and Soyabean oils 1.4 MT (against 1.667 MT last year).
Production of oilseeds during 2009-10 was around 24.9 MT compared to 27.7 MT in 2008-09 and 29.8 MT in 2007-08.
Quoting Centre for Monitoring of Indian Economy, he told an international seminar that the forecast for the current year production is at 28.2 MT.
"Imports were higher in 2009-10 as depreciation of dollar Vs rupee has made it more attractive, he said adding disparity in domestic seed crushing led to poor capacity utilisation. .
Besides the profit margin of oilseeds processors deteriorated severely in new season and many plants were operating at much lower capacity to minimise the losses," Mehta said.
He, however, said that India would continue to be a large importer of vegetable oils thanks to its strong GDP growth, rising population, growth in per capita consumption and less oilseeds production.