Trade accords rankle edible oil industry

The edible oil industry has urged the government to exclude import of these oils and related products from the bilateral and regional free and preferential trade agreements.

In a communication to commerce and industry minister Kamal Nath, Central Organisation for Oil Industry and Trade (COOIT) chairman Ajay Tandon has said that import of these oils, including vanaspati, under preferential trade agreements would adversely impact the interests of local industry and vegetable oil growers.

The products like oilseeds, edible oils, vanaspati, margarine, oilcakes, oilmeals and related products should, therefore, be included in the negative list under such bilateral and regional accords, he has suggested.

Tandon said the import of cheaper oils under these agreements would cause a further set back to domestic oilseeds and edible oil production and jeopardise the livelihood of farmers.

He has referred to the agreement with Sri Lanka which had now led to setting up of more vanaspati units there for export of this product to India.

"Sri Lanka has issued 10 licences for vanaspati manufacturing, of which six are in commercial production with permission to each to export 25000 tonnes of vanaspati to India annually under the free trade agreement. If the remaining four licensees go into production, the total permissible exports to India may reach 2.5 lakh tonnes, against total indigenous production of 1.3 million tonnes. This would seriously impact indigenous industry", the COOIT chief said.