AGRICULTURE SECRETARY Emmanuel F. Piñol is batting for tariffs on palm oil from Malaysia and Indonesia, claiming that imports have been flooding the Philippine market to the detriment of Filipino producers.
In a briefing on Thursday, Mr. Piñol said he will recommend “trade remedies” citing the huge increase in imports of palm oil from both Malaysia and Indonesia. “From only 20 million kilos in 2016, Malaysian palm oil arriving in the country breached about 200 million kilos. Indonesia was at about 120 million kilos for 2017,” Mr. Piñol said.
“According to our WTO (World Trade Organization) negotiators, the Philippines could invoke a claim of injury to the industry and for the next 200 days, we could impose tariffs on these items so that we’ll be able to protect our local farmers and local industry from further injury.,” Mr. Piñol added. — Reicelene Joy N. Ignacio
