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KUALA LUMPUR (March 24): Describing Malaysia’s biodiesel mandate as “almost a shame,” leading palm oil analyst Dorab Mistry said the government is “doing nothing” to promote biodiesel.
“I am afraid that (Malaysia’s) implementation of biodiesel is almost a disgrace. There are individual areas where Malaysia has done brilliantly, and I am a huge fan of Malaysia.
“But in the implementation of biodiesel, it is riding on the back of Indonesia. They are doing nothing to promote biodiesel, which is a sad fact, ”Mistry said during a question and answer session at the Lauric and Palm Oil Price Outlook Virtual Conference today.
Malaysia’s B20 (20% palm oil biofuel) mandate for the transportation sector has been delayed until December 2021 in Peninsular Malaysia. The mandate has been implemented in Sarawak since September 2020 and is scheduled to be implemented in Sabah in June 2021.
Indonesia, meanwhile, has implemented a B30 biodiesel mandate and plans to upgrade it to B40 soon.
Mistry, a director at Godrej International Ltd, praised Putrajaya for zero-rate export tariffs on crude palm oil (CPO) last year.
“The Malaysian government does sensible things from time to time, and I spent the entire past year complementing Malaysia. I know that this decision was personally made by your prime minister to completely exempt palm oil from all export taxes last year, and that was a masterstroke.
“In one fell swoop, it took away the export market to Indonesia and Malaysia became a thriving exporter,” said Dorab, noting that the prices of Bursa Malaysia Derivatives crude palm oil futures contracts are dictated by Malaysia’s palm oil stocks.
Mistry also expects Malaysia to “do the sensible thing” by bringing in foreign workers in June or July to ease the labor shortage in the country’s plantation sector.
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