Jakarta – There are 17 kinds of vegetable oils/animal fats available at the global market, which are used as edible oils or raw materials by food industries and feedstocks to produce biofuel and other non-food products.
Data from the Palm Oil Agribusiness Strategic Policy Institute (PASPI) shows that four of the 17 vegetable oils/animal fats are vegetable oils which contribute more than 90 percent to the global production and consumption of vegetable oils. The four main vegetable oils are palm oil, soybean oil, rapeseed oil, and sunflower oil. Based on the PASPI report, if compared to other vegetable oils, the palm oil has the following three advantages, which cannot be matched by other vegetable oils:
First, oil palm trees have relatively big trunks, grow fast and have a long life cycle of between 25-30 years. Having such characteristics, the oil palm plantations have bigger capacities to absorb carbon and produce oxygen if compared to other vegetable oils.
Second, the palm oil has a big volume of production, which is even the largest in the global market of vegetable oils. PASPI reported that based on data from USDA (2021), the global production volume of palm oil (CPO+PKO) reached 84.2 million tons or around 40.3 percent from the total global production of vegetable oils. With such big volume, the palm oil has a very significant influence on the global market of vegetable oils.
Third, palm oil supply is relatively more stable than other vegetable oils from month to month along the year. The palm oil can be produced sustainably from oil palm trees since the age of 4 years. The oil palm trees can produce CPO and PKO at stable volume every month until they reach the age of 25 years. The stability of palm oil supply has created a certainty in the global market of vegetable oils. (*)
Source: Warta Ekonomi