“We hope Malaysian exporters can grasp this golden opportunity to sell the premium and nutritious red palm oil to China, a multi-segment market with the most diversified consumers in the world,” Malaysian Palm Oil Board (MPOB) director-general Ahmad Parveez Ghulam Nadir said today.
Previously, red palm oil was not allowed to enter into China due to the colour specification in the existing Chinese Standard for Palm Oil which was set at a maximum 3.0 red. Most of the red palm oil produced in Malaysia are detected at 7.0 red and above.
“The newly-announced Chinese Group Standard allows the import of red palm oil without the barrier effective from March 1, 2021,” he said in a statement here.
Besides red palm oil, China also announced the official implementation of the Chinese Group Standard for Palm Kernel Cake.
Parveez explained that the Chinese Group Standard for Red Palm Oil was the result of multiple stakeholder engagements and extensive bilateral cooperation between the MPOB and respective Chinese authorities, which enabled the entry of Malaysian red palm oil into China.
In 2014 and 2015, MPOB conducted an intervention programme with the Lanzhou University to help fight Vitamin A deficiency among 2,000 school children in Gansu Province through the use of red palm oil which contains natural carotenes, a pro-Vitamin A and powerful antioxidant.
“The programme effectively helped to reduce the incidence of Vitamin A deficiency among children from 21.6% to 6.1% after six months of intervention and MPOB takes pride in the corporate social responsibility initiative which was jointly carried out with the Chinese Nutrition Society,” said Parveez.
In addition, MPOB, through its regional office in Shanghai, China, also known as the Palm Oil Research and Technical Service Institute of MPOB (Portsim China), together with local industry players and research institutes have jointly developed food and animal feed formulated with red palm oil.
These products, including the red palm-based extruded snacks, red palm hot pot soup stocks, red palm dog food, and red palm feed for layer chickens will help strengthen the Malaysian palm oil markets in China through reaching out to the Chinese producers as well as consumers.