The New Nation - Internet Edition

BSS, Dhaka

The consumption of edible palm oil is rapidly increasing in the country and the market forecast says Bangladesh will join the million metric tons importers' club of palm oil in the next few years.

However, there is no indication that the prices will cool down from the present over heating. "The global market is volatile fuelling the escalating prices," an industry source said.

"It appears from projections that in 2011, Bangladesh would be a member of one million metric tons club for import of crude palm oil (CPO) and crude palm olein (CPL) of 10,11000 tonnes," said the market forecast.

The Malaysian Palm Oil magazine 'Fortune' in its recent publication made the forecast. It said the country's import of CPO and CPL; which is partially refined, was only 170,000 tonnes in 2000 but by the year 2006 the import reached the 878,908 tonnes level.

It is a 417 per cent rise to make Bangladesh an important South Asian destination of Malaysian palm oil and its position will only further consolidate over the next couple of years, the magazine said.

The industry statistics however showed the year 2007 was an exceptionally bad year when palm oil imports declined by 33.87 per cent in the backdrop of soaring rise in its prices along with prices of other edible oils and fats in global market. But the decline turned into a positive growth again this year as the imports for January-April period showed a 29 perb cent growth to a total of 260,792 tonnes over the corresponding period of the year 2007.