Bursa Malaysia Berhad (“Bursa Malaysia”) will once again host the annual Palm & Lauric Oils Conference and Exhibition / Price Outlook 2008/2009 (POC) on 25 to 27 February 2008 at the Kuala Lumpur Convention Centre. This flagship conference, going into its 19th year, provides an avenue for discussions on the various developments and issues affecting the palm oil industry, including progress that will impact the price outlook of palm and lauric oils.
This conference is a key international event for global palm oil industry players as Malaysia is the world’s largest producer of palm oil and home to the highly successful Crude Palm Oil Futures (FCPO) contract. Currently, its FCPO contract is the leading benchmark for the pricing of crude palm oil internationally.
Dato’ Yusli Mohamed Yusoff, Chief Executive Officer of Bursa Malaysia said, “The FCPO contract is one of the most actively traded derivatives products offered by Bursa Malaysia and represented almost 50% of our total derivatives contracts in the year 2007. In fact, the FCPO broke records and charted an impressive performance in 2007 where it traded 2.8 million contracts. As palm oil is one of the most widely traded edible oils in the world, this spells much potential for FCPO. Bursa Malaysia is also keen to leverage on the highly successful FCPO contract and expand its derivative product range to offer a new USD denominated Crude Palm Oil Futures (FUPO) contract in the near term.”
Over 1,500 delegates from the global oils and fats industry are expected to attend this year’s POC conference. This conference will see a gathering of individuals from different cross sections of the industry; such as traders, producers and regulators, each one presenting differing inputs and insights. The three key discussion categories at POC are the “Lauric Oil Session”, “Palm Oil and Major Oils and Seeds Session” and “Biodiesel Session” where eminent speakers and industry experts from various countries will lead the discussions and presentations.
Several interesting activities have also been organised to make POC 2008 a much-anticipated event. Amongst the highlights for this year apart from the conference are the annual golf challenge, exhibition, welcome cocktail reception, gala dinner and pre-conference oil palm plantation tour.
