Indonesia, the world's top palm oil exporter, will produce 23.8 million tonnes in 2011 versus 22.0 million tonnes last year, Hamburg-based oilseeds analysts Oil World forecast on Tuesday. The forecast is 100,000 tonnes higher than Oil World's previous estimate though below the 25.0 million forecast by industry analyst Dorab Mistry.
Palm oil prices have fallen steadily in March and April on increasing output plus fears larger South American soyabean crops will intensify competition with soyaoil. "The shortage of palm oil has come to an end," Oil World said. A rise in Indonesian output to or slightly above 24 million tonnes "cannot be ruled out", it said. Oil World has not changed its forecasts for Malaysia's output.
Although global palm oil demand and exports have been sluggish in April, more sales could be made to China, Oil World said. "China has become an active buyer of palm oil in recent weeks, taking advantage of the much-improved price competitiveness of palm oil relative to soyaoil and other vegetable oils," it said.
"Following subdued imports in January-March 2011, we now expect Chinese palm oil imports to pick up noticeably in April, reaching at least 550,000 tonnes." This would be up from only 152,931 tonnes imported by China in March while China's Ministry of Commerce has forecast that 305,688 tonnes of palm oil will be imported in April.
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