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India's edible oil imports are likely to fall for the first time in recent years to 14 million tonnes in 2016-17 against 14.6 million tonnes reported last year.
Atul Chaturvedi, President, Solvent Extractors' Association of India (SEAI), informed that an increase in oilseeds production for the year 2016-17 would improve the availability of oilseeds and will revive the country's crushing industry, which has been starving for the raw material.
As against the country's total edible oil consumption of nearly 21 mt, the domestic production is hardly 6-6.5 mt, while India has to import nearly 15 mt to bridge the gap between demand and supply.
Demand for edible oil has been rising at a pace of 3-4 per cent per annum, which is 700,000-800,000 tonnes per annum.
"Fortunately, this year we had a bumper groundnut and soyabean crop and now in Rabi, we are expecting a record crop of rapeseed of around 7 mt. With this, we are expecting an increase in availability of edible oil and for the first time, this will check the rising import after many years," added Chaturvedi.
On the fortification of edible oils, Chaturvedi informed that the Government was keen to promote food fortification and recently FSSAI had issued a draft Food Safety and Standards (Prohibition and Restrictions on Sales) Amendment Regulations, 2016 prescribing the standards for fortification of various foods, including edible oils.
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