Primary Industries Minister Teresa Kok believes that China's plan to purchase an additional 1.9 million tonnes of palm oil from Malaysia in five years will help local smallholders tremendously.
"I cannot tell how it will help the (palm oil) price, because just like the price of petroleum, the price of palm oil fluctuates and changes everyday.
"But definitely, it is a big help to the smallholders," she told the media when attending a forum on B7 biodiesel implementation in Selangor today.
"That's a lot for over five years. We expect an increase of 200,000 tonnes (in palm oil exports to China) in this year," she said.
Kok added she will continue to follow up on the matter, and was making arrangements to travel to China in May to sign more memorandums of understanding then.
According to her, a special task force has been set up to closely monitor the additional palm oil exports.
In a press conference last week, Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad had said that Putrajaya was "taking advantage" of the resumption of the East Coast Rail Link deal to secure China's purchase of palm oil, although the two matters were not directly related.
[More to follow] - Mkini
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.