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Consumers of the country are being cheated by the traders who have been selling palm oil in the name of soybean oil taking higher rates.
Retailers sell the palm oil in the name of soybean oil in the local markets taking advantage of lax market monitoring by the authorities concerned, the speakers observed.
The officials of the Malaysian Palm Oil Promotion Council (MPOPC) disclosed this at a press conference at a local hotel Saturday.
"The market monitoring is an administrative matter, and we have nothing to do in this regard. But we have already launched a massive awareness campaign among the consumers highlighting the palm oil globally," said deputy Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the MPOPC, Mohamed Abd Majed.
He said even in Malaysia the retailers cheat the consumers, but the consumption of palm oil in Malaysia is 95 per cent compared with other edible oil.
This is the global phenomenon, where the retailers take the opportunity to sell the palm oil in the name of soybean oil and cheat consumers, said AKM Fakhrul Alam, country manager of Bangladesh, Nepal and Myanmar of the MPOPC.
He said palm oil plays an important role to meet the demand of edible oils in Bangladesh.
Fakhrul said in fiscal 2004-05 letters of credit (LCs) worth US $ 454,01 million opened for import of crude palm oil against $ 489.55 million in 2003-04.
"We consider Bangladesh as an important destination of our product as the consumption of edible oil has been increasing gradually with the rapid growth of urbanisation and population," said Malaysian High Commissioner in Bangladesh Dato' Ashaary Sani.
"In fact, consumption of oils has witnessed a tremendous growth in last eight years from 1996 to 2004. In 1996, the consumption of oil and fats in the country totalled was 0.60 million tonnes, which increased to 1.13 million tonnes in 2004," Majed said.
In 2004, the global palm oil production was 29.7 million tonnes, an increase of 6.5 per cent from 27.9 million tonnes in 2003, Majed said adding that Malaysia remained the largest producer with a 47 per cent share compared with 48 per cent in 2003.
During this time Asia Pacific, Sub-continent and Europe were the key markets, taking up 75 per cent of total Malaysian exports, he said.
Majed said China remained the largest importer with 3.08 million tonnes, up by 12.31 per cent and accounted for about 25 per cent of Malaysia's total export, followed by European Union countries, India, Pakistan, USA, Egypt, UAE and Bangladesh.
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