BANGI: The Malaysian Palm Oil Board (MPOB) has received between RM5 million and RM6 million in royalties per annum for 651 transfer of technologies (TOT) that are applicable for palm oil commercialisation.
Its deputy director-general (R&D) Dr Ahmad Parveez Ghulam Kadir said the TOT commercialisation rate of 30 per cent was higher than the palm oil industry’s average rate of five to 10 per cent.
“We use the royalties that we receive to pay the researchers for their efforts and also encourage them to come out with new useful technologies for the industry,” he told reporters after the MPOB TOT Seminar and Exhibition 2019 yesterday.
The board has patented 357 technologies and launched 174 services, with the commercialisation rate for the patented technologies being up to 28 per cent last year.
Meanwhile, Primary Industries Minister Teresa Kok Suh Sim said in her opening speech at the seminar that MPOB today unveiled 16 new technologies and five new services.
These technologies and services, she said, could be categorised based on the sub-sectors of the industry, such as plant protection, plant biotechnology, milling and processing, animal feed, oleochemicals and food formulations.
“We encourage industry players to adopt these technologies and innovations in their business activities and the government will continue to provide a supportive environment in commercialising new technologies to further boost the palm oil products.
“In the long run, this would further enhance the competitiveness and resilience of the Malaysian palm oil industry globally,” she said.
She also points out that the non-food applications for the palm oil industry were an important new area that should be further explored by the industry.
“Biofuels, biomass, animal feed and building materials such as polyurethane, cosmetics and personal care products have huge commercial potential and there are already some palm oil industry players making it big in this new frontier.
“The growing world population and the increasing demand for food are favourable factors supporting the bullish fundamentals for the food commodity,” she added.
MPOB also launched two latest mobile applications, namely SawitSecure and Ganoderma Information Database (GanoID), yesterday.
SawitSecure is a mobile application of biosecurities palm for palm oil industry, designed for an easy access platform to comprehensive resources and information of more than 600 exotic pests, diseases and weeds of palm oil from 44 palm oil growing countries.
Meanwhile, GanoID is a platform for sharing the latest information that serve as a foundation towards future establishment of geographical data-based large scale disease prediction model for early disease prevention.
GanoID benefits those who are actively carrying out research on Ganoderma, especially on the species identification and retrieval of its associated environmental and morphological area. — Bernama