Rapid Fire
India-Malaysia Agricultural Ties
- 20 Jul 2024
- 2 min read
Recently, India and Malaysia have decided to deepen their bilateral cooperation in agriculture, with a particular emphasis on oil palm cultivation and the integration of digital technology.
- Areas of Cooperation: Discussed collaboration to advance the National Mission on Edible Oil - Oil Palm (NMEO-OP). Addressed market access issues for agricultural and allied products.
- NMEO-OP, launched in 2021 to increase oil palm cultivation and crude palm oil production to 11.20 lakh tonnes by 2025-26. It is operational in 15 states, targeting an area of 21.75 lakh hectares.
- The Oil Palm Mission aims to promote oil palm in new areas by providing support to farmers including planting material, buyback assurance, and protection from global price volatility through viability gap payment.
- India imports 57% of its edible oil, impacting the Foreign Exchange reserves by USD 20.56 billion. India imports palm oil every year, accounting for around 56% of the total edible oil imports.
- At present against a total potential area of around 28 lakh hectares, only 3.70 lakh hectares are under oil palm cultivation.
- Andhra Pradesh, Telangana and Kerala are major Oil palm growing States and account 98% of total production.
Read more: National Mission on Edible Oil-Oil Palm
