Edible Oil Price

Edible Oil Price

Subject :Economy

Section :Agriculture

Context:

The data on all-India Daily Weighted Average Prices of Major Edible Oils, available on the Department of Consumer Affairs’ website, shows that the prices of five edible oils – mustard oil, vanaspati, soya oil, sunflower oil and palm oil – have declined by 2-8 per cent in the past one month but they are still 3-21 per cent higher than their last year’s levels.

With consumers yet to get respite from the higher edible oil prices, the Centre has asked the edible oil companies to reduce their MRP by Rs 15 per kg as the edible oil prices in the international market are witnessing a downfall.

Concept:

• Primary sources of Edible oil (Soybean, Rapeseed & Mustard, Groundnut, Sunflower, Safflower & Niger) and secondary sources of Edible Oil (Oil palm, Coconut, Rice Bran, Cotton seeds & Tree Borne Oilseeds).
• India depends on imports to meet its domestic edible oil demand. In 2019-20, the country imported about 13.35 million tonnes of edible oils or about 56% of the demand.
• This mainly comprised palm (7 million tonnes), soyabean (3.5 millon tonnes) and sunflower (2.5 million tonnes).
• The major sources of these imports are:
  •  Argentina and Brazil for soybean oil;
  • Indonesia and Malaysia palm oil; and
  • Ukraine and Argentina again for sunflower oil.

• Price Monitoring Division (PMD) in the Department of Consumer Affairs
  • It is responsible for monitoring prices of selected essential commodities.
  • It monitors the retail and wholesale prices, and spot and future prices of selected essential commodities on a daily basis.
  • The DoCA collects daily price data of 22 essential food commodities including six edible oils — palm, groundnut, mustard, vanaspati, soya and sunflower — from 179 centres across the country. The department also collects daily prices of pulses, sugar, rice, wheat, tea, salt, milk and vegetables such as tomato, onion and potato.
  • In the event of shortage of any specific essential commodity and to keep price of the item under control, Price Monitoring Division also implements commodity-specific market intervention schemes to give temporary relief to the consumers.
  • Generally, prices are reported for the Fair Average Quality of the item for a given centre.