Envoy: Malaysian import increasing

Business, Normal
Source:

The National, Thursday January 21st, 2016

 By SHIRLEY MAULUDU

MALAYSIAN High Commissioner to Papua New Guinea Jilid Kuminding says his country’s import of liquefied natural gas from PNG is increasing, among other commodities. 

Kuminding, pictured,  told The National that although Malaysia was importing at a much smaller volume compared to other major contractors, the import volume was increasing.  

“When you start exporting LNG and petroleum, we are among the biggest buys of LNG – quietly,” he said.

“Not as big as Japan and those big contractors but we are also buying a lot of your crude petroleum and energy.” He was commenting on the trade relations between the two countries. 

He said Malaysia imported from Papua New Guinea commodities valued at RM451.27 million (K304.97 million), representing a growth of 72.3 per cent (RM189.27 million (K127.9 million)) from the previous corresponding period.

He said the main contributors were agricultural produce valued at RM224.05 million (K151.4 million) – an increase of A$93.76 million (K191.7 million) in value.

It is followed by petroleum products (increase from RM48,060 to RM43.11 million (K29.13 million)) and crude petroleum (from nil to RM36.77 million (K24.84 million)). 

“The exports derived from Papua New Guinea’s ExxonMobil LNG plant which began exporting in 2014 has significant contributed to the increase in Malaysia’s import from the country,” Kuminding said. 

The five top imports last year were agriculture produce, palm oil and palm oil based products, petroleum products, crude petroleum and vegetable oil. 

Kuminding said he was pleased with the growth of trade between the two countries.

He said PNG was Malaysia’s third largest trading partner in Oceania. Globally, PNG is ranked Malaysia’s 51st largest trading partner.