Vegetable oil imports rose 27 per cent to 8.32 lakh tonne in April on account of a sharp increase in the shipment of crude palm oil (CPO) and crude soft oils, the Solvent Extractors Association of India today said.

Imports stood at 6.54 lakh tonne in the same month of the previous year, it said in a statement.

India meets about 60 per cent of its annual vegetable oil demand of 17-18 million tonne via imports. Palm oil makes up 80 per cent of the country’s total vegetable oil imports.

“Indian refiners prefer to import crude soft oil over CPO in India, which has reflected in the pattern of import in the last few months,” it said.

While crude soft oil imports rose two-fold to 2.83 lakh tonne in April 2014 from 1.39 lakh tonne a year-ago, the shipment of palm oil import fell 7.45 per cent to 5.36 lakh tonne from 4.98 lakh tonnes.

Among crude soft oils, the import of soyabean increased to 1.13 lakh tonne from 50,000 tonne. Similarly, import of sunflower oil rose to 1.7 lakh tonne from 88,368 tonne.

Among palm oil variants, the shipment of CPO rose 87 per cent to 4.38 lakh tonnes from 2.33 lakh tonnes, while the import of RBD palmolien declined sharply to 81,100 tonne from 2.53 lakh tonnes.

According to SEAI, import of non-edible oils fell marginally to 13,325 tonne in April this year compared with 13,500 tonne in the year-ago period.

As on May 1, edible oils stock at various ports is estimated at 4.65 lakh tonne, of which CPO stood at 2.3 lakh tonne. About 7 lakh tonnes of edible oil is in the pipeline.

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