<article><p><i>Corrects to "down" in paragraph 4</i></p><p class="lead">Sri Lanka has banned palm oil imports with immediate effect and is phasing out domestic cultivation to be replaced by more eco-friendly crops.</p><p>Coconut plantations will also be uprooted at a rate of 10pc to make way for rubber or other environmentally-friendly crops each year, according to President Gotabaya Rajapaksa.</p><p>Deforestation issues have driven the change, although the Sri Lanka Palm Oil Association disputes this and argues that the country produces just 44,000 t/yr of coconut oil and 18,000 t/yr of palm oil, leaving a deficit of 98,000 t/yr of its total edible oil consumption.</p><p>Sri Lanka imported 131,000t of palm oil last year, down from 160,000t in 2019, with almost 90pc coming from Malaysia.</p><p>This will make barely a dent in Malaysia's exports that totalled 15.4mn t in 2020. The Sri Lankan ban has had little impact on crude palm oil futures prices today on the fob Bursa Malaysia exchange, which were up by 51 ringgit/t ($12.34/t) as of 13:06 Kuala Lumpur time (05:06 GMT) to 3,790 ringgit/t for June.</p><p class="bylines">By Amandeep Parmar</p></article>
