By 2020, India will import about 70% of its vegetable oil demand.

(Agricultural Wealth Network) According to the Director General of India's National Oilseed and Vegetable Oil Development Authority, if the government does not take measures to increase domestic oilseed yields and re-impose import tariffs on palm oil, about 70% of India's vegetable oil demand will be met by imports by 2020.

Indian demand for vegetable oil is estimated at 13 - 14 million tonnes and is increasing year by year due to accelerated growth in the middle stage and a steady flow of cheap palm oil supplies from Malaysia and Indonesia.

Since last year, the government has stopped imposing import duties on palm oil.

India has become the world's biggest importer of vegetable oil this year as dry weather hurts oilseed crops. About 40 to 50 percent of India's vegetable oil needs are met through imports. Most imported cooking oil is palm oil.

India's oilseed varieties are good, he says, but farmers have been frustrated by weak monsoon rains this year as a large number of cheap vegetable oils are imported into the domestic market. Only 20 per cent of the peanut crop has irrigation water, while soybean and rapeseed crops are almost entirely rain-fed.

Heavy rain is likely to hit western India's Gujarat and Maharashtra states overnight on November 11 or tomorrow due to a low pressure in the Arabian Sea region, according to the Indian Meteorological Bureau.

The western states of Gujarat and Maharashtra are India's major cotton, oilseed and sugarcane producing regions.

The Indian government is trying to upgrade irrigation facilities, but the cost is too high and it takes time. The government must first reimpose import duties, which may help raise some money.

Oilseed acreage in India has doubled from a decade ago to 27 million hectares as the government raises minimum purchase prices for vegetable oil. However, the yield of oilseeds is low, only about 1 ton/hectare.

India grows nine types of oilseeds each year, including soybeans, rapeseed and peanuts. The annual output of domestic vegetable oil is about 8.2 million to 8.5 million tons.

One way to address India's gap in vegetable oil supply and demand is to plant more oilseed crops such as oil palms on wasteland.

A team of Indian experts has identified about 800,000 hectares of arable land suitable for oil palm cultivation, but oil palm cultivation projects have been slow and the Indian government has not declared oil palm a plantation crop like sugar cane, coffee and rubber, making it difficult for companies to grow oil palm on their own arable land.