Third International Sunflower Seed & Oil Conference to be Held in Mumbai

India will be hosting the third International Sunflower Seed and Oil Conference (ISSOC) 2019 on 19 and 20 July in Mumbai. The ISSOC conference, hosted by Solvent Extractors' Association of India (SEA), will witness participation from global industry leaders, government representatives, researchers and experts.

Piyush Goyal, Union Commerce & Industry Minister is expected to be the Chief Guest while Devendra Fadnavis, Maharashtra Chief Minister, will preside over the Inaugural Function.

More than 300 delegates from all over the world having interests in sunflower seed, oil & meal are likely to attend this conference in Mumbai city. Members of CIARA, Argentina led by H.E. Dr. Luis Miguel Etchevehere, Agriculture Secretary (Minister) will also take part in the conference.

Moreover, International Trade Centre (ITC) Geneva of UN under their project Supporting Indian Trade and Investment for Africa (SITA) is mulling to send a delegation of Sunflower seed growers or processors from Tanzania and Uganda to participate in this International Conference, according to SEA statement.

What is India’s consumption of sunflower oil?

India is the chief importer of sunflower oil with imports of around 2.8 million tonnes. The global sunflower oil import is nearly 9.6 million tonnes. This shows India’s importance in the global sunflower seed & oil market as every producer / exporting nation in the world looks to India for a market.

Sunflower seed is considered as a healthy table-seed & culinary seed with broad applications in variety of food preparations that includes cakes and pastries.

About Sunflower Oil Association

The International Sunflower Oil Association was established in the year 2015 in Rome by National Associations & Companies from Russia, China, Ukraine, Spain, Hungary and Argentina. It aims to encourage & endorse better communications amongst - sunflower oil producers, academic researchers, industry groups and local governments, as well as improving sunflower oil value addition & enlarging the field of its commercial application.

The 1st International Sunflower Oil Symposium & ISOA launching ceremony was held in October 2015, in China and the 2nd conference was held in July 2017 in Ukraine.

The global sunflower seed output in 2018-19 is estimated at 51.41 million tonnes, sunflower oil at 19.45 million tonnes and sunflower meal at 20.90 million tonnes. The top producers of sunflower are Russia, Ukraine and Argentina. China, India, France, Belarus, Hungry, Romania, Kazakhstan, Turkey, Tanzania, are countries that produce relatively smaller quantity.

The leading importers of sunflower oil are China, India, Iraq, Iran, Egypt, Turkey and EU. The main importers of sun meal are France, China, Turkey, Poland, Belarus, Spain, and India among others.