Guangxi to buy more palm oil from Malaysia
Author: Admin | Filed under: Palm Oil Local NewsBy Ooi Tee Cheng
Business Times
9 September, 2010
NANNING: China’s southern province of Guangxi plans to buy more Malaysian palm oil as its food processing industry advances and its 48.6 million population grows, said several government officials.
It now imports around 20,000-30,000 tonnes of palm oil from IOI Corp Bhd.
“We welcome Malaysia’s investment. The oils and grain sector is a strategic area of focus,” said Li Xing, vice-mayor of Qinzhou.
“Over the last decade, Singapore’s Nobel Group has upgraded its grain processing plant to produce 600,000 tonnes of soyameal a year to feed the pigs, water buffaloes and poultry farms here,” she told Business Times on the sidelines of a media preview tour of the China-Asean Expo here recently.
Guangxi’s cake and biscuit industry uses palm oil for cooking oil and margarine, said Jiang He Sheng, vice-mayor of Quigang city. Apart from small shipments into Guangxi province, IOI Group’s main client is China’s largest food and oil trader, Cofco Ltd.
Other palm oil giants with extensive refineries in Indonesia such as Singapore’s Wilmar International Ltd and Kuala Lumpur Kepong Bhd trade regularly with China.
With 1.3 billion people, China is the largest vegetable oil consumer in the world. Last year, it imported 6.6 million tonnes of palm oil. Â Guangxi, which nestles among Yunnan, Guizhou, Hunan and Guangdong provinces, has a coastline of 1,500km.
It was reported the Guangxi government will pump in six billion yuan this year to expedite port facility upgrades to meet greater demand from Asean.
Currently, its three ports, namely Beihai, Fangchenggang and Qinzhou, have established routes with 220 ports in 80 countries.
The total annual throughput of the ports rose by 16.3 per cent year-on-year to reach 94 million tonnes in 2009.
