Vessels

PalmTrack—May 2022 Wrap Up

Here is a wrap up of the some of the issues PalmTrack covered in May 2022:

  1. We’ve been updating a lot on the changed political-policy landscape for Indonesian palm oil. Note that the Jokowi administration has been struggling to get cooking oil at the right price to Indonesia consumers for months, toggling between the export-restricting DMO-DPO rules and export duty/levies. 

  2. Experts expressed surprise at Indonesia’s intentions to reimpose a domestic sales requirement effective 31 May 2022. CIMB in its agribusiness brief dated 23 May expects the potential impact of the regulation to depend on the new volumes and price obligations set by the government, it is overall still too early to conclude how the DMO will impact the market and/or palm oil players due to the lack of details.

  3. Weather and rainfall: On notable rainfall events (30 days to 11 May 2022), 30 days accumulated rainfall was est. above 500mm in Central and East Kalimantan, where a significant area has within those regions recorded an accumulated rainfall of est. above 500mm. On 13 May, BMKG issued a warning of heavy rainfall accompanied by storms and strong winds for several Indonesian provinces, including Aceh, and West and South Sumatra.

  4. Tankers from Indonesia: Port calls for 25 Apr–8 May 2022 (14 days) count, c.50 palm-related tankers, with sample net tonnage c.295k (versus 14 days to 10 Apr, c.60 tankers with sample net tonnage c.330k). These two weeks (25 Apr–8 May), the share of port calls was higher for European ports; conversely, the share is lower for CIS and American ports (versus 14 days to 10 Apr).

  5. On 7 May, the Indonesian navy seized its third vessel, the Mathu Bhum, after seizing two others, the World Progress and Annabelle, a week earlier. A review of the Mathu Bhum’s movement shows that the vessel was doing unloading/loading operations on 7 May 2022 at Belawan’s container port.


Khor Reports’ PalmTrack is an independent research service that tracks palm tanker movements and reports trade of palm products (and shipments, upon request) for selected trade routes. It features a forward-looking market topic and sharp analysis every quarter, e.g. palm biofuels issues & opportunities for Jan–Mar 2022. Subscribe now!

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PalmTrack Resumes!

PalmTrack resumes after a two-week break, bringing you more news and analysis on the palm products trade.

The last three months of 2021 saw some significant updates in the area including: (1) expectations of further port delays and congestions at major Chinese ports amid AIS data block and tighter pandemic-related regulations; and (2) our watchlist of nearly 50 palm-related vessels; and (3) vessel movements of selected trade origins and/or destinations, including tanker presence at the Dumai area, Indonesia-India tanker voyages, and tankers travelling from Malaysia, Papua New Guinea, and Thailand.

This year, we start off with a three-part series on the analysis of the issues and opportunities in palm biofuels. We have just published Part 1, which looks at the USD billions involved and who is more or less committed to spending and paying for it. We have also looked at the impact of the flash floods on palm oil supply in Indonesia and Malaysia. Subscribe to PalmTrack to read these posts!

Written by KHOR Yu Leng and Nadirah SHARIF of Khor Reports/Segi Enam Advisors, PalmTrack is a free, members-only space offering exclusive updates focusing on the palm products trade and presenting info-data driven insights with reference to granular trade statistics, near-time shipment/cargo information, and human-source market intelligence. Our coverage centres around Indonesia’s ports. Click the link below to subscribe!

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[Sample!] PalmTrack—Global Map of Key Palm Oil Company Vessels

PalmTrack continues with its exclusive update on palm tanker movements. Here’s a sample article of what we’ve been up to recently:

The above near real-time map shows estimates of tankers associated with major palm oil groups for 14 Dec 2021. Most appear to operate more frequently within the Southeast Asian region, with several deployed to key destinations including India, China, and Sri Lanka. We have a tanker watchlist of nearly 50 vessels of over 3 million net tonnage; many of these vessels appear in the map above, including the GS Future, Venus, and Melati Dua.

research@segi-enam.com | 14 Dec 2021

For online view only. Please to do not redistribute without our express permission. We offer subscription services for those who wish to do so.

Corporate Subscription (upcoming) offers more granular info-data details on product, trade and vessels mentioned in our reports.


Khor Reports’ PalmTrack is an independent research service that tracks palm tanker movements and reports trade of palm products (and shipments, upon request) for selected trade routes. It features a forward-looking market topic and sharp analysis every quarter, e.g. palm biofuels issues & opportunities for Jan–Mar 2022. Subscribe now!

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PalmTrack—A December 2021 Recap

As PalmTrack enters well into its second month, we continue to offer readers exclusive updates on the palm products trade. Here are a few snippets of the news we covered this past month:

We have a tanker watchlist of nearly 50 vessels with over 30 million net tonnes associated with key palm oil companies. Subscribe to PalmTrack and head on over to our post to see a near real-time map showing the estimated positions of some of these tankers.

As 2021 draws to a close, there are several recent key news and chatter surrounding the palm oil trade. Read our post for some of our market observations about food safety, sustainability, and Thailand from our interviews with experts.

Following reports on Indian refiners reducing their palm oil purchases and making the switch to sunflower and soybean oils, we have collected data on palm-related tankers sailing from Indonesia to India. Read our post for an analysis of this sample of data.

Other news:


Khor Reports’ PalmTrack is an independent research service that tracks palm tanker movements and reports trade of palm products (and shipments, upon request) for selected trade routes. It features a forward-looking market topic and sharp analysis every quarter, e.g. palm biofuels issues & opportunities for Jan–Mar 2022. Subscribe now!

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[Sample!] PalmTrack—Indonesia-India Vessel Movement

To give a feel of what has been going on on PalmTrack, here’s a sample article on Indonesia-India vessel movements:

Indian refiners are reportedly lowering their palm oil purchases, reducing their Nov 2021–Jan 2022 shipments, and making a switch towards sunflower and soybean oil imports instead. The steep rally in palm oil price has reduced its discount, giving way to rival oils.

India imports 13-15 million tonnes of palm oil a year, i.e. over 1 million tonnes a month. We had a preliminary look at tanker movements from Indonesia to India based on ship published origins and destinations (which is usually incomplete because not all vessels make full reports). This sample of tankers, covering an estimated 10% of total India monthly imports, largely originates from Riau and South Kalimantan and goes to Gujarat and Kerala. Top destination ports were Kandla (Gujarat), Vizhinjam, Cochin (Kerala), Haldia (West Bengal), and Mangalore (Karnataka).

Based on trade intelligence, we know the sample of tankers have been associated with major palm trader-processors and cargoes (YTD 2021); see text bubbles for key names. To review actual shippers and cargo, other datasets* can be reviewed.

We have further details for both arrival and departures by port/province/region, vessel tonnage, and granular information to jetties.

*It would also be useful to review customs info-data (not included in this summary). Please reach out to us at research@segi-enam.com.

research@segi-enam.com | 3 Dec 2021

For online view only. Please to do not redistribute without our express permission. We offer subscription services for those who wish to do so.

Corporate Subscription (upcoming) offers more granular info-data details on product, trade and vessels mentioned in our reports.


Khor Reports’ PalmTrack is an independent research service that tracks palm tanker movements and reports trade of palm products (and shipments, upon request) for selected trade routes. It features a forward-looking market topic and sharp analysis every quarter, e.g. palm biofuels issues & opportunities for Jan–Mar 2022. Subscribe now!

$380.00
Every year
$38.00
Every month

PalmTrack: A Month's Reflection

It’s been a busy month for PalmTrack—from observations about vessel movements to weather outlooks, PalmTrack continues to offer exclusive updates surrounding the palm products trade. Some more recent topics we’ve written about include an alert for a La Niña phenomenon in the coming months; major palm oil players who have been using containers are switching to bulk shipments; the conclusion of a near three-week observation of the ports in the Dumai area.

ASMC (Oct 6, 2021): “September to November (SON) season rainfall anomaly composites (mm/day) for El Niño (left) and La Niña (right) years. Brown (green) shades show regions of drier (wetter) conditions. Note that this anomaly composite was generated using a limited number of El Niño and La Niña occurrences between 1979 and 2017 and therefore should be interpreted with caution (data: NOAA CPC CAMS_OPI).”

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