Philippines hopes to replace palm oil with coconut oil

Philippine politician Joey Salceda called on the Philippine Coconut Authority (PCA) to take a course on increasing the production and export of coconut oil. In his opinion, the product can become a “good substitute” for palm oil on the market in anticipation of a possible rise in the cost of the latter.

Salceda said that contracts for the supply of coconut oil now amount to $1,100 per ton, and palm oil only wins in price by a couple of tens of dollars, although the cost of “palm” has already increased by 20% over the past month.

“I encourage the Philippine Coconut Authority to find ways to market local coconut oil as an alternative to palm oil,” he says. “This will help our coconut farmers enter the export trade, or at least benefit from it.”

The politician also recalled that the Philippines is the largest producer of coconut oil in the world, and the product itself occupies a significant share in the structure of national agricultural exports.

According to OleoScope, starting from MY 2016/17, about 1.5-1.7 million tons of coconut oil are produced annually in the country.

Tags: palm oil, coconut oil, Philippines, prices