Edible oil should not be used for bio-fuel production: SEA
New Delhi (PTI): Concerned over the rising price of edible oil in domestic market, an industry body on Monday said use of edible vegetable oil overseas for non-food purposes like making bio-fuel needs to be discouraged.
The prices of edible oils have skyrocketed in the last one year due to its increased non-food usage, especially for bio-diesel purposes, the Solvent Extractors' Association of India (SEA) President Ashok Sethia said.
"It is high time public opinion is created on National and international platforms to discourage the use of edible oils for fuel purpose," he added.
The production of edible oil globally is 3.5 per cent at 150 million tonnes as compared to mineral oil, which is about 4,250 million tonnes. Even if the entire quantity of edible oil is made available for bio-fuel, it would make only 3 per cent of fossil oil, he said.
But, diverting 5-10 per cent (7.5-15 million tonnes) of edible oil towards non-food usage makes a huge difference and "will have serious impact on the supply and price", Sethia said, adding the SEA plans to discuss the issue during the Kharif Convention on October 27 at Nagpur.
"The use of edible oil for fuel purpose will further increase or shall encourage shifting of acreage of oilseeds crop to bio-fuel crop like maize or sugarcane and the world will be further deprived of edible oil for food use," he said.
He feared that rapeseed oil, palm oil and soybean oil would be used as bio-diesel with prices of crude oil rising to USD 90 per barrel.
Globally, about nine million tonnes of bio-diesel are produced and plans are afoot to further scale up production in the next two years, he said.
Agri. & Commodities
