Cooking Oil Ban Rescinded in Rangoon

Seven brands of cooking oil that had been banned for health reasons a month ago are now available again after the Yangon [Rangoon] City Development Committee authorized their sale, according to businessmen in the former Burmese capital.

A merchant at Bayintnaung Market in Rangoon told The Irrawaddy that an announcement about the lifting of the ban appeared in the 7 Days journal earlier this week, but did not provide any details about which brands were affected.

The Health Ministry banned 11 imported cooking oil products from Thailand and Malaysia on July 25 for allegedly using harmful dyes. Among the brands removed from the market were Sakura, Fisherman, one Prawn, Fried Fish, Crab Water Dragon and Red Star.

The reason given for the ban was that the products cause hypertension, heart disease and cancer.

It was not immediately clear why the ban had been lifted. Kyaw Linn, the director of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), which operates under the Health Ministry, told The Irrawaddy on Friday that his agency did not authorize the move.

“I didn’t even know that the Yangon City Development Committee had reversed the ban,” he said.

Business sources in Rangoon said that this could be the latest evidence of tensions between the military-owned Union of Myanmar Economic Holdings, Ltd (UMEHL) and Tay Za, a crony of Burma’s top generals and one of the country’s richest businessmen.

The sources speculated that the UMEHL pressured the FDA to impose the original ban in a bid to limit competition from Tay Za’s trading company, which imports the cooking oils.

However, the decision to allow the resumption of sales of seven banned cooking oil products suggests that Tay Za has come to some sort of arrangement with the authorities in Rangoon, Burma’s main commercial center.

“Recently, they [Tay Za and UMEHL] have been competing a lot for market share. It’s good to see, because they control most of the business opportunities in this country,” said a businessman in Rangoon.

However, it appears that the UMEHL is using its status as a military-controlled enterprise to ensure that it maintains an advantage over privately owned companies, even ones close to the ruling regime.

An employee of Tay Za’s Htoo Trading Company said the announcement of the ban in July was a serious blow to the company.

Tay Za is regarded as a major player in the Burmese economy. He has close ties to Burma’s leading generals, earning him and his companies a place on the US State Department’s sanctions blacklist.

According to a shopkeeper in Rangoon, the recent ban on 11 brands of cooking oil raised the price of cooking oil from 1,700 kyat (US $1.70) to 2,200 kyat per viss (1.53 kg).

Consumers use on average 10 kg of cooking oil a year, according to data from the Myanmar [Burma] Edible Oil Dealers Association.