India Slashes Import Duties on Vegetable Oils Amid Price Surge

India has taken steps to ease rising domestic vegetable oil prices by reducing basic import duties on major oils. The move comes amid a sharp increase in oil prices, which have risen by nearly 20% over the past year.

The biggest change affects sunflower oil, with the basic duty on crude sunflower oil cut from 10% to zero. Additionally, the basic duty on refined sunflower oil was reduced from 32.5% to 22.5%. Duties on crude palm and soybean oils were lowered from 10% to 5%, while duties on refined palm and soybean oils decreased from 32.5% to 27.5%.

The effective import tax burden remains above the basic duty, including additional levies for agricultural infrastructure development and social welfare. This means the effective duty on crude sunflower oil will fall to 5.5% from 16.5%, while crude palm and soybean oils' effective duty will decline to 11% from 16.5%.

The government hopes these lower rates will encourage vegetable oil imports into India and support demand on global markets during the peak consumption season, which spans September to November.