`Olive Oil and Rice Bran Oil Compete for Indian Markets - Olive Oil Times
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Olive Oil and Rice Bran Oil Compete for Indian Markets

By Olive Oil Times Staff
Aug. 19, 2014 08:38 UTC

The European Commission, in part­ner­ship with Spain’s Articles about Interprofesional del Aceite de Oliva Español, has issued a three-year mar­ket­ing cam­paign focused on pro­mot­ing Spanish olive oil, a grow­ing sta­ple in Indian diets.

According to the Economic Times, India’s demand for olive oil is up 40 per­cent from last year and the coun­try expects this num­ber to con­tinue to rise. This is in part due to lower prices as a result of last year’s increased olive oil pro­duc­tion in Spain and also the effect of higher incomes and spend­ing in India.

A Borges ad fea­tur­ing the actress Chitrangada Singh

Spain cur­rently sup­plies India with 89 per­cent of its olive oil and has pro­duced 1.7 mil­lion tons of olive this year com­pared to 1.3 mil­lion tons last year, the ET reports. VN Dalmia, pres­i­dent of the India Olive Association, said they intend to import 14,300 tons of olive oil this year com­pared to 11,000 from last year.

Meanwhile, Borges India, a lead­ing provider of Spanish oils has just launched its own media cam­paign, fea­tur­ing actress Chitrangada Singh, and expects the demand for their prod­uct to grow 50 per­cent, says direc­tor Rajneesh Bhasin.

The push for more imported oil puts rice bran oil com­pa­nies in strict com­pe­ti­tion.

While both olive oil and rice bran oil pro­vide ample health ben­e­fits, rice bran oil has his­tor­i­cally been lead­ing the edi­ble oil indus­try in India due to its lower cost and avail­abil­ity. According to Angshu Mallick direc­tor of a top rice bran dis­trib­u­tor Adani Wilmar, the Availability of rice bran is much smoother as India is one of the lead­ing rice pro­duc­ers. Olive oil is mostly used in sal­ads and soft cook­ing whereas rice bran is used in fry­ing and cook­ing Indian dishes.”

Business Wire India recently reported over 40 per­cent of urban Indians have high cho­les­terol and triglyc­erides and 140 mil­lion peo­ple in India are liv­ing with high blood pres­sure. Unhealthy seed oils and fried snacks are blamed as lead­ing causes of these health prob­lems.

Still, dietary aware­ness is on the rise in Indian com­mu­ni­ties. The Times of India recently pub­lished a call for women to increase the amount of essen­tial nutri­ents in their diet mak­ing it rich in nutri­ents such as cal­cium, vit­a­min D, and olive oil.


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