NIelsen global snack survey

Khor Reports: An interesting survey on snack preferences. It is a $374 billion industry. Many snacks are processed foods, so of major interest to the palm oil sector. Notably, chocolate is the most popular snack. Other important categories include chips, cookies, bread and ice cream. Check out the graphic below from Businessweek.com and also the report linkage from Nielsen and graphic on retail sales by region.

In terms of attributes, it is interesting to read that sustainable/fair trade attributes preference rate similar to organic and that low fat preferences rate lower than low salt and low sugar. In terms of  very important / moderately important/ slightly important/ less (?) important:
GMO free: 43%, 30%, 16%, 11%
Low salt/sodium: 34, 37, 19, 10
Low sugar / sugar free: 34, 37, 19, 10
Low fat: 32, 36, 21, 11
Sustainable / fair trade: 35, 34, 19, 12
Organic: 34, 35, 20, 11



source: Businesweek.com from Nielsen

global snacking study;





Report link:

Global Consumers Nibble, Nosh and Snack Their Way to Big Sales, Global  | 09-30-2014
"Whether you need a quick-fix on the go or a stand-in for a meal, snacks are more than just tasty treats; they’re also big business. Global snack sales totaled $374 billion annually as of March 2014—an increase of 2%* year-over-year, according to Nielsen retail sales data.... Europe ($167 billion) and North America ($124 billion) make up the majority of worldwide snack sales, with sales flat in Europe, and growing at a 2% rate in North America, compared to the previous year. Conversely, while annual snack sales in Asia-Pacific ($46 billion), Latin America ($30 billion) and the Middle East/Africa ($7 billion) are significantly lower than in the other two regions, annual growth in these largely developing regions increased more over the past year—4% in Asia-Pacific, 9% in Latin America and 5% in the Middle East/Africa.... While sugary and salty snacks take the lion’s share of sales, the fastest-growing snack categories are the ones to watch. Sales of savory snacks, which include crackers, rice cakes and pita chips, increased 21% in the last year in Latin America. Meat snacks, like jerky and dried meat, grew 25% in the Middle East/Africa and 15% in North America. Refrigerated snacks, including yogurt, cheese snacks and pudding, jumped 6.4% in Asia-Pacific, while dips and spreads, which include salsa and hummus, rose 6.8% in Europe....“Non-sugary snacks closely aligned with meal-replacement foods are showing strong growth, which signals a shift in a consumer mindset to one focused on health,” said Dunn. “While conventional cookies, cakes and confections categories still hold the majority share of snack sales, more innovation in the healthy snacking and portable food space is necessary to adjust to this changing dynamic.”...
http://www.nielsen.com/us/en/insights/news/2014/global-consumers-nibble-nosh-and-snack-their-way-to-big-sales.html


Higher oil palm yields are bad ?

Khor Reports: Environmentalists and others have been concerned about the extensification of oil palm, arguing that expansion should be on degraded land and that the focus should be instead on yield increases. The Indonesian state appears to be moving toward making degraded land easier to use via new regulations. For quite some time, there has been a great deal of work and effort going into intensification or higher yields. So you would have thought that better yields achievements would be welcomed. However, an article in Science (covered by scientificamerican.com) now argues that yield increase is NOT a good thing after all.... Hard to please on any front? It makes oil palm planting too valuable / lucrative?


News links:

Good Palm Oil Yields Could Be Bad News by Cynthia Graber; "Increased palm oil yields could unintentionally have the effect of creating a bigger demand for land for even more palm oil planting. Cynthia Graber reports... in an article in the journal Science, researchers show how the increased yield could in fact lead to even more tropical destruction. Because as the value of palm oil planting increases, farmers could want to plant on even greater tracts of land. Which is bad news....  Also, a future increase in supply could eventually lead to a decrease in prices. So palm oil could out-compete, say, rapeseed oil from Canada. Which would lead to an even higher demand for palm oil. Which is worse news....  In addition, current low yields and high production costs means oil palm is not planted much in Africa and South America. But higher yields could make oil palm attractive to planters in those regions, leading to even more tropical forest destruction. [L. R. Carrascol et al, A double-edged sword for tropical forests].... 
http://www.scientificamerican.com/podcast/episode/good-palm-oil-yields-could-be-bad-news/

Article link:

Science 3 October 2014:  Vol. 346  no. 6205  pp. 38-40   DOI: 10.1126/science.1256685 
•Perspective Conservation
A double-edged sword for tropical forests
L. R. Carrasco1,  C. Larrosa1,2,   E. J. Milner-Gulland2,  D. P. Edwards3+ Author Affiliations
1Department of Biological Sciences, National University of Singapore, 117543 Singapore.
 2Department of Life Sciences, Silwood Park Campus, Imperial College London, Ascot, Berkshire SL5 7PY, UK.
 3Department of Animal and Plant Sciences, University of Sheffield, Sheffield S10 2TN, UK.
E-mail: dbsctlr@nus.edu.sg (L.R.C.); david.edwards@sheffield.ac.uk (D.P.E.)

With a growing global population and increasing per capita consumption, reconciling agricultural production with biodiversity conservation is a major challenge to humanity (1). A frequently promoted solution to stem the tide of agricultural expansion is to increase crop yields, allowing global demand to be met without further tropical forest losses. Recent genome sequencing of key crops such as oil palm, eucalyptus, rubber, soybean, rice, and cocoa could facilitate substantial yield increases (2–4). Could such yield improvements offer a solution to both tropical forest loss and agricultural demand, or could they pose further challenges to tropical conservation?
http://www.sciencemag.org/content/346/6205/38

Indonesia smallholders get MOA-UNDP support

Khor Reports comment: Indonesia has been moving ahead with various programs to improve sustainability in its palm oil sector. These range from increasing high-key awareness of its efforts in sustainability improvements (e.g. moratorium and REDD+ programs, high-level attendance at international meetings and more) and also more precautions such as a bill to protect farmers' interests. There is a clear impetus for the Ministry of Agriculture to intermediate efforts as there are widespread concerns that unfettered international voluntary programs could be unintentionally disruptive or divisive of the palm oil supply-chain, especially for its small producers and smallholder farmers.

Indonesia's program with the UNDP has been in the works for some time, and the Sustainable Palm Oil Initiative’s (SPOI) national platform was just launched (see news item at bottom). It seeks to help the smallholder sector. Industry talk has been that Indonesian policy makers and bureaucrats had not been so pleased with some private sector programs that asked smallholders to take out significant loans to join sustainability programs which had no promise of premiums to cover the cost thereof. Indeed, key programs often do not highlight the "cost-effective" and "inclusive" principles within their sustainability approach (some other agro-commodities programs are better at doing so). These two features are important for small producers and smallholder farmers; else they be excluded and/or continue to lose bargaining and pricing power to middle-men.

We'll have to find out more about the UNDP program in due course - including its costs and benefits. Smallholders have so far been neglected in the drive for sustainability, so this new program should be a plus. With crucial national and multilateral support, the program can hopefully look beyond narrow commercial interests too. It was already well known in the early days of economic sustainability that "unequal trade deals" would be risky (see blog posting below).

The escalating push for sustainability points toward variable market access or restrictions and hence multi-tier pricing for the commodity. Will a high risk sourcing zone status result in an international price discount? Fortunately, smallholders should retain privileged market access. However, program efforts are needed to effectively secure this and ensure that most of or the majority of any premiums for this category actually reaches smallholders.

Sustainability markets are narrow, shallow and obscure. But the big changes they portend is generating heightened interest and scrutiny.

Related blog posting: /khorreports-palmoil/2014/04/revisiting-brundtland-report-1987.html
Tuesday, April 15, 2014;  Revisiting Brundtland Report 1987
Khor Reports: The risks in unequal trade deals has long been recognized, even in the earliest days of the international push for change for sustainability in its broadest sense (inter-generational equity and more) . The UN’s "Our Common Future" / Brundtland Report of 1987 was still heavy on a government role and the principle of “sharing” and conflict mitigation between unequal institutions in the developed world and the developing world. This thinking seems of lower currency in the 2000s sustainability movement (or not highly practiced), including in the sector of palm oil sustainability, which has been narrowly driven on the basis of eco-certification or labeling. The narrower approach is associated with greater competition among NGOs for control of market share in eco-labels and market access policies, as seen across various agro-commodities. In palm oil, top Indonesia policy makers and industry associations are stepping up on regulatory changes and plans for national spatial landuse mapping. Is this the return of government to mediate the uneven negotiations of the big B2NGO2B deal phase? Also witness Australia state government moves to raise the standard on NGO claims and reduce the problem of market boycotts; /khorreports-palmoil/2014/04/australia-resource-industries-seek-ban.html.

News links:

Palm oil certification gets int’l support by Tama Salim, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta | Business | Sat, October 04 2014, 1:19 PM; "Indonesia, the world’s largest producer of palm oil, has launched an internationally backed nationwide program to improve the livelihoods of small-scale oil palm growers by helping them obtain national certification for sustainable practices....The Agriculture Ministry, in partnership with the United Nations Development Program (UNDP), officially launched the Sustainable Palm Oil Initiative’s (SPOI) national platform to help low-income oil palm farmers increase their productivity and improve environmental management....Agriculture Minister Suswono said the UNDP had donated US$15.5 million for the five-year program, which aims to get smallholders to abide by Indonesian Sustainable Palm Oil (ISPO) standards, a mandatory sustainability certificate introduced by the government in 2010....According to Suswono, the SPOI program is targeting 4.4 million hectares of oil palm smallholdings, or equal to 44 percent of the country’s total oil palm plantation area. As many as 2.2 million farmers tend the smallholdings, most of which are in need of revitalization and better management. He said he hoped the program would help plantations drive up productivity by at least 5 tons per hectare. Currently, small-scale growers produce 2.5 to 3 tons of crude palm oil (CPO) per hectare, lower than the private sector’s production potential of 6 tons per hectare....The international community, however, has been loathe to recognize the ISPO, saying it does not do enough to ensure sustainability, especially since Indonesia has a weak system of law enforcement. The ISPO lacks 11 percent of the indicators found in the RSPO, including high conservation value, while the RSPO will need 25 percent additional indicators to fully comply with the ISPO.... http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2014/10/04/palm-oil-certification-gets-int-l-support.html

Felda Global IPO revisited (update 1)

21 September 2014: Lots of talk about Felda Global / FGV share price among KL share market observers. It recently fell to a low of RM3.46/share. Notably below even the most pessimistic view (Macquarie - see below) at the time of its IPO in mid 2012. The 52-week share price trading range: 3.460 - 4.700.
 
source: Bloomberg.com, 19 September 2014
 
  
13 July 2012: Credit Suisse issues report on Felda Global, 12 July 2012: "We initiate coverage on Felda Global Ventures (FGV) with an UNDERPERFORM rating and a target price of RM4.90, a potential downside risk of 11%. There are far better choices—younger age profile with more attractive valuations—in the region. We prefer Genting Plantations and Sime Darby in Malaysia, London Sumatra and Salim Ivomas in Indonesia.... Positives: large, leveraged to palm oil prices, fast-tracked to the indices, net cash position, clear dividend policy and a turnaround plan for downstream... Negatives: Old with falling yields, low profitability, minimal organic growth, potentially less transparency, 1QFY12 results have halved... Expensive and fully valued at CY12 and CY13 P/Es of 16.9x and 17.4x respectively..."

Source: Credit Suisse


Khor Reports Comment: This is the second "underperform" rated report on Felda Global by an investment broker that we have seen. Another report, issued by Macquarie Equities Research on 29 June 2012, gives a price target of RM3.85.

Jokowi-JK cabinet - with new Agrarian Ministry

Khor Reports comment: More news is emerging on the Jokowi-JK cabinet. We'll collate them here for you. You can also read earlier news on the cabinet planning and Indonesia presidential race here: /khorreports-palmoil/2014/06/indonesia-presendial-race.html. Notable for those in plantation and agribusiness are the new Agrarian Ministry (we know in our meeting with industry experts, that Indonesia plantation business interests were keen to have a ministry focused on their concerns - is this it?). Also note the to-be rejigged Agriculture and Food Sovereignty Ministry (currently the Agriculture Ministry, with additional functions currently overseen by the Forestry Ministry and the Maritime Affairs and Fisheries Ministry). There are efforts being made to stream-line the functions of ministries and the elimination of deputy minister roles is proposed. 34 ministries are anticipated, with 18 run by ministers with professional backgrounds.

News links:

Jokowi says Cabinet to  have 34 ministries by Dylan Amirio, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta | National | Mon, September 15 2014, 8:04 PM; "President-elect Joko “Jokowi” Widodo announced on Monday the structure of his future Cabinet, elaborating that there would still be 34 ministries in his government and that 18 ministers would have professional backgrounds. “We are looking for a strong, structured Cabinet that is willing to work efficiently with the government in carrying out programs,” Jokowi said at Transition House in Menteng, Central Jakarta... Jokowi did not announce the names of his ministers, but said that 18 would have professional backgrounds while 16 would come from political parties in his coalition..." http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2014/09/15/jokowi-says-cabinet-have-34-ministries.html

Jokowi to have new ministries, eliminate deputy ministers by Bagus BT Saragih and Hans Nicholas Jong, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta | Headlines | Mon, September 15 2014, 9:48 AM; "President-elect Joko “Jokowi” Widodo will make moderate adjustments as he crafts his Cabinet, employing only minor changes to accommodate his vision but with close attention to the values of effectiveness and efficiency, which may result in reviewing the positions of some deputy ministers and director generals... Many previously expected that Jokowi would reduce the size of the Cabinet, which consists of 34 ministers under President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, on the basis that the move could save a significant amount of the state budget... Jokowi and vice president-elect Jusuf Kalla, however, considered the number ideal given the size of the country’s population. Jokowi has also taken into account the consideration that too many changes could also lead to adjustments that will cost the state budget and take time... Andi Widjajanto, one of the deputy heads of Jokowi-Kalla’s transition team, said the two leaders would have the final say on the Cabinet composition by Sept. 15 at the latest... Jokowi has asked us to reassess the effectiveness of the structures of the ministries by, for example, identifying overlapping tasks and functions done by different director generals at different ministries,” said Andi... The 34 ministries being scrutinized by Jokowi-Kalla include 19 ministries with the exact same names as they possess today and three new ministries.
“As many as 12 ministries are with different names, which is partly due to the merger of some functions overseen by different ministries,” Andi said... For example, issues related to higher education will be taken from the Education and Culture Ministry and given to the Research and Technology Ministry, which will then be become the Research, Technology and Higher Education Ministry... The three new ministries proposed are the Agrarian Ministry, the Population Ministry and the Creative Economy Ministry... Jokowi-Kalla will also likely scrap all deputy minister positions, except at the Foreign Ministry. There are currently 19 deputy ministers in Yudhoyono’s Cabinet. “The duties of almost all deputy ministers can be handled by the director generals.

New ministries:
1. Agrarian Ministry
2. Population Ministry
3. Creative Economy Ministry

Ministries with new names or merged
• Maritime Ministry (currently the Maritime Affairs and Fisheries Ministry)
• Infrastructure Ministry (currently the Public Works Ministry)
• Agriculture and Food Sovereignty Ministry (currently the Agriculture Ministry, with additional functions currently overseen by the Forestry Ministry and the Maritime Affairs and Fisheries Ministry)
• Research, Technology and Higher Education Ministry
http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2014/09/15/jokowi-have-new-ministries-eliminate-deputy-ministers.html