Govt investigates tainted CPO exports

JAKARTA (JP): The Ministry of Industry and Trade said it would investigate how 19,000 tons of crude palm oil being transported from North Sumatra to the Netherlands were tainted with diesel oil.

"I sent a team to Medan this morning to investigate the case," Director General of Foreign Trade Djoko Mulyono said on Friday.

The team also will inspect Medan's Belawan Port, where the crude palm oil (CPO) was loaded onto the ships, he said.

The CPO left the port in three shipments.

Djoko said he requested a report from PT Sucofindo, the state- owned surveyor company which inspected the CPO shipments.

He also said he planned to send a letter to the Indonesian Embassy in the Netherlands to inform them of the matter, and would forward copies of the letter to other Indonesian embassies in Europe.

"Just because we had this problem in the Netherlands, exports to other countries should not be disrupted," he said, noting that 25,000 tons of CPO were currently on their way to the Netherlands.

He said the matter was serious, but dismissed speculation of sabotage by business competitors.

"It's unlikely that business competitors did this because several exporters were affected, including state-owned companies," he said.

The Dutch Product Board for Margarine, Fats and Oil was quoted by Reuters as saying on Tuesday the first tainted CPO shipment from Indonesia was discovered on Oct. 4, adding that the CPO contained about 1.7 percent diesel oil.

The other two shipments contained 0.05 percent and 0.4 percent diesel oil respectively, or about one teaspoon per liter.

Indonesian traders had no answer as to how the contamination could have occurred.

A number of traders suspected the CPO could have been tainted in the storage tanks at Belawan. They said port officials only tested the CPO for water, fatty acid and dirt.

Indonesia is the second largest palm oil producer after Malaysia. Total CPO exports in 1999 are estimated at between 2.5 million and three million tons. Of this amount, it is estimated 300,000 tons will be exported to the Netherlands. (03)