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Aim: The scheme aims to incentivise the production of palm oil to reduce dependence on imports and help farmers cash in on the huge market.
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Under the scheme, oil palm farmers will be provided financial assistance and will get remuneration under a price and viability formula.
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The special emphasis of the scheme will be in India’s north-eastern states and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands due to the conducive weather conditions in the regions.
Note: The government of India has planned to raise the domestic production of palm oil by three times to 11 lakh MT by 2025-26. This will involve raising the area under oil palm cultivation to 10 lakh hectares by 2025-26 and 16.7 lakh hectares by 2029-30.
What was the need of the Mission on Palm Oil?
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India is the world’s biggest buyer of edible oils.
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India buys more than two-thirds of its total edible oil imports as palm oil.
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In 2016-2017, the total domestic consumption of palm oil by India was 9.3 million MT, with 98.97% of it imported from Malaysia and Indonesia.
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This means India was domestically producing only 1.027% of its requirement.