More Cooking Palm Oil Hits Thai Markets

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More cooking palm oil hits markets

By Petchanet Pratruangkrai

The Nation

In Photo: Supply of cooking palm oil has entered into market which mainly of the imported lot go to modern trade giants.

About 23 million litres of cooking palm oil has been gradually released since yesterday to the market mainly to modern traders to ease serious shortage. However, consumers still have to limit their purchasing and wait for another 120,000 tonnes of crude oil import.

The survey by the Commerce Ministry yesterday found that more cooking palm oil under 10 different brands are available at five modern traders, which have 60 per cent allocation from 30,000 tonnes of crude palm oil.

About 13.75 million litres of cooking palm oil have been distributed via modern traders, one million litres to fresh market, 2.25 million litres to food retailers and local traders in each province, and 6 million litres to small retailers.

Commerce Minister Porntiva Nakasai said that the ministry will continue allocate cooking palm oil via several distribution channels to ensure adequate supply for consumption. However, the shortage has not been eased yet and need to produce another 120,000 tonnes of import palm oil to the market next month. She said that after the government has approved an import of 150,000 tonnes of crude palm oil, the shortage should be relieved in the next one to two months.

The remaining of 120,000 tonnes of crude palm olein will not only allocate to cooking palm oil producers, but also to industries including soap, instant noodle, and other food producers.

After that the oil palm will be cultivated in the country and more supply will be entered to the market as normal, she said.

However, the ministry found that soybean oil has been shortage in some supermarkets as consumers have shifted to use soybean oil, instead of palm oil, which retail price is comparative.

Supply of soybean oil has been lowered by 30 per cent from normal period. The retail price of soybean oil is quoted at Bt55-60 a litre bottle, higher than the controlled price of Bt46 a litre bottle.

Porntiva said that the ministry will seriously inspect retailers after finding some traders have increased retail price unfairly.

-- The Nation 2011-02-03

[Thaddeus]

Translation please.

Supply of cooking palm oil has entered into market which mainly of the imported lot go to modern trade giants.

[janverbeem]

Porntiva said that the ministry will seriously inspect retailers after finding some traders have increased retail price unfairly.<BR sab="384"><BR sab="385">

Naah,they wouldn't do that,would they.

From one day to the other there are shortages in every kind of food grade oil.Try to find some sunflower oil as of lately.For sure this would not be a result of unfair speculating.

[Pib]

Translation please.

Supply of cooking palm oil has entered into market which mainly of the imported lot go to modern trade giants.

Bottles of imported palm cooking oil, imported from from Malaysia I think,which will be fairly close price-wise to what Thai's were paying recently.

The selves have definitely been flat-out empty to just a few bottles of what Thai's referred to as "farang" cooking oil such as canola cooking oil (usually States side canola oil) which costs around three times the price of Thai palm/sunflower/soy bean cooking oil. The wife and I were at Makro last week (shelves basically empty except for farang cooking oil) when they brought out about 20 cases of soy bean cooking oil....man, it was like a free-for-all as people rushed, durn near fought over, getting their one bottle of oil as there was a oil bottle limit per customer.

[Pib]

Just came back from Makro on Kanchanaphisk Outer Ring Road here in Bangkok...they now have plenty of corn oil at around 90 baht per bottle (limit 3 bottles per person), and had a limited supply of imported palm oil in 3 packs with each bottle running around 90 baht (once again limited to 3 bottles). Three or four days ago when we went to Makro they only had the imported farang canola oil. So, it doesn't appear any significant palm oil supply has arrived Makro yet (or at least the Makro store I use).

[bitterbatter]

Palm oil is crap. It would be much better if they didn't restock the shelves. Use virgin coconut oil instead, your body will be much much healthier for doing so.

[Pib]

When it comes to cooking oils most Thai's don't really care about health factors (even though some may say they do)...it boils down to what is low cost, easy to get, and tastes good to them....palm cooking oil fits those three requirements. They could go for pork oil which has risen in use due to the palm cooking oil shortage, but pork cooking oil gives food a dark appearance, tastes good to many, but most Thai's don't really like using it...any yes, it's has a really high fat content.

Edited February 3, 2011 by Pib