SUMMARIES OF TARIFF INFORMATION COPRA (PAR. 1727) Comment Copra, the dried meat of the coconut, is one of the world's major sources of vegetable oil, and the principal source of the so-called lauric-acid oil, which is important in soap making (see summery on coconut oil, dutiable, except from the Philippines, under par. 54, and also subject to processing tax). The yield of oil from copra is about 63 percent. The residue or cake remaining after the oil is extracted is a valuable cattle feed (see summary on oil cake and oil-cake meal, par. 730). The coconut palm (Cocos nucifera) is found in most tropical regions where soil and climate are favorable, particularly in coastal areas. About 85 to 90 percent of the coconuts come from small native holdings, the remainder being produced on estates. Data on production are not available, but it is estimated that the total prewar output of cocomits, in terms of copra, was about 4 million short tons annually. About one-half of the coconuts are utilized locally in the producing areas, and about one-half exported, either as copra or as coconut oil. of the world exports during the period 1935-39-equivalent to about 2 million short tons of copra annually-copra constituted about three-fourths and the copraequivalent of oil about one-fourth. Before World War II the principal exporters of copra and coconut oil were the Philippine Republic and the Netherlands Indies. Malaya and Ceylon were of substantial, and New Guinea of lesser, importance as exporters. Those five countries together supplied more than 85 percent of the total world exports. India, though a major producing country, has for many years imported more copra than it has exported. The United States produces no copra and only insignificant quan tities of coconuts. Before World War II the acreage of coconuts in the more important producing regions was increasing, and the methods of production were improving. But during the war the principal exporting regions lost most of their copra-producing equipment and facilities (not, however, the trees themselves). As a consequence the total annual world production of copra is still (1950) probably below the prewar average, despite the fact that beginning in 1947 the output of the Philippine Republic has been much larger than before the war. The United States is one of the principal consumers of coconut oil, all of which is imported, either as oil or as copra. Before the war more than half of its requirements entered in the form of the oil rather than as copra; during 1935-39 the average annual imports of copra were 460 million pounds, whereas the copra-equivalent (oil yield, 63 percent) of the average annual imports of coconut oil was 580 million pounds. However, because of wartime destruction of oil mills in the primary producing regions, United States imports since the war have been mostly in the form of copra. (See table 2.) This preponderance of the imports of copra over those of coconut oil appears likely to decline, however, as the rehabilitiation and rebuilding of oil mills in the Philippines has proceeded so rapidly that the present (1950) copra-crushing capacity of the islands is said to exceed that of prewar years. Consequently, that country's exports of coconut oil may, in the future, equal or exceed (in terms of copra) its exports of copra as such. 877032 O 50 - 20 UNITED STATES TARIFF COMMISSION COPRA Table 2.- United States imports of copra and coconut oil, in specified Source: Official statistics of the U. S. Department of Commerce. In 1940 and 1941 United States imports of copra increased to somewhat more than the prewar average of nearly 500 million pounds annually. During 1942-45, however, they were only one-third to one-half the prewar average. After the war imports greatly increased and they were 789 million pounds in 1946 and 1,355 million pounds in 1947. In 1948, imports were 895 million pounds--much smaller in volume, but greater in value, than in 1947. The total foreign value of imports in 1948 was 109 million dollars, as compared with a range in immediate prewar years of from 7 to 18 million dollars. The increase in the value of imports in postwar years, although due partly to the larger quantities imported, resulted principally from notably higher prices, which reflected the world shortage of fats and oils in this period. The United States has, since 1922, obtained most of its imports of copra from the Philippines--except in 1932 and during World War II. (The islands have been also the dominant source of United States imports of coconut oil.) The primacy of the Philippines as a source of copra and coconut oil was strengthened by the favored position accorded that country with respect to the processing tax on coconut oil by the United States Revenue Act of 1934. This law imposed a tax on the first domestic processing (a term interpreted to include the extraction of the oil) in the United States of coconut oil of 3 cents per pound on oil from Philippine copra, and 5 cents per pound on oil from non-Philippine foreign copra. During the period September 1942 to August 1949, because of inadequate supplies, the 2-centsper-pound differential in favor of oil from Philippine copra was suspended, the tax rate in this period being 3 cents per pound on all coconut oil processed in this country, irrespective of its source (if imported as oil) or of the source of the copra (if crushed in the United States from imported copra). In August 1949, the processing tax on oil from non-Philippine copra was again fixed at 5 cents per pound. Most of the United States imports of copra enter on the Pacific coast, but considerable quantities enter also at New Orleans and Baltimore. Small quantities of imported copra are reexported. Reexports amounted to about 37 million pounds annually during 1937-39. This went to Latin America, principally to Mexico. SUMMARIES OF TARIFF INFORMATION PALM NUTS AND PALM-NUT KERNELS Tariff Status Par. 1727. Palm nuts and palm-nut kernels were free of duty under the Tariff Act of 1922, and are free of duty also under the Tariff Act of 1930. Their duty-free status was bound in the trade agreement with the United Kingdom, effective January 1939, and in the Geneva Agreement. Under section 2470 of the Internal Revenue Code, palm-kernel oil is subject to a processing tax of 3 cents per pound on its first domestic processing. Since this oil is produced in the United States from imported nuts and kernels, the tax is in effect a tax on the kernels, based on the oil content thereof. As the yield of oil from palm kernels is about 45 percent, the 3-cent tax on the oil is equivalent to 1.35 cents per pound ($27.00 per short ton) of palm kernels. Trade Statistics Table 1.- Palm nuts and palm-nut kernels: 1/ United States imports for Reported separately in 1939 and subsequent years. Palm nuts are included as follows: 114 pounds, valued at $22, in 1939; 138,500 pounds, valued at $21,733, in 1943; 46,280 pounds, valued at $6,679, in 1946; 11,200 pounds, valued at $1,318, in 1947; and 34,408 pounds, valued at $6,033, in 1948.. 2/ Preliminary. Includes French Somaliland 1937-39. All from India. Source: Official statistics of the U. S. Department of Commerce. UNITED STATES TARIFF COMMISSION PALM NUTS AND PALM-NUT KERNELS Comment Palm nuts are the product of the West African oil-palm, Elaeis guineensis, a tropical tree which grows wild throughout equatorial Africa, and is cultivated on plantations in Indonesia, British Malaya, and Ceylon. The individual fruits, which grow in large bunches, consist of a nut with a fibrous, oily pericarp, the latter being the source of the palm oil of commerce. The nuts themselves are somewhat similar in size and shape to plump peach pits. The kernels, which represent about 25 percent of the nuts, yield about 45 percent of oil by weight. Palm kernel oil, unlike palm oil, is a lauric-acid oil. (See separate summaries on palm oil and palm kernel oil, pars. 54 and 1732.) Under normal conditions, only the kernels enter international trade but during and since World War II small quantities of the nuts (in the shell) have been exported. Palm nuts are not produced in the United States. Statistics on production in foreign countries are not reported. In Africa, the leading producer, the natives use the kernels to a limited extent for food; but most of the kernels from the nuts gathered in that region are exported. Virtually all of the kernels produced in the Far East are exported. World exports averaged about 1.5 billion pounds (760,000 short tons) annually during 1935-39 1/, of which 91 to 97 percent originated in Africa, Nigeria alone accounting for about one-half of the world total. World exports were greatly reduced during the war, and the limited data available indicate that they are still (1950) considerably below their prewar volume. United States imports of palm kernels amounted to 87 million pounds, valued at 2.6 million dollars (foreign value), in 1937, to 24 million pounds, valued at $375,000, in 1938, and to 8.3 million pounds, valued at $124,000, in 1939 (see table 1), During the early war years imports declined to negligible quantities, but in 1944 and 1945 they increased to 59 and 83 million pounds, respectivelymuch more than in 1939 or 1939. During 1946-48 imports were small, but for January-November 1949 they amounted to 9 million pounds, valued at $812,500. Most of the imports have come from Africa but in some years substantial quantities have come from Indonesiɛ. During and since the war small quantities of palm nuts, as distinguished from kernels, have been imported into the United States, principally from Ceylon and Australia (see table 1, note 1). 10. S. Department of Agriculture, Foreign Agriculture Report No. 11, August 1946. World exports of palm kernels during 1935-39 were about one-third as much as those of copra (the meat of the coconut from which coconut oil is derived). * SESAME SEED Par. 1727. Sesame seed is free of duty under this paragraph of the Tariff Act of 1930. Section 2491(d) of the Internal Revenue Code imposes (effective August 21, 1936) an import-excise tax on this commodity. The summary covering sesame seed is to be found in Summaries of Tariff Information, Volume 7, Part 5. SUMMARIES OF TARIFF INFORMATION MISCELLANEOUS OIL-BEARING SEEDS AND NUTS 1/ Tariff Status Par. 1727. Oil bearing seeds and nuts not specially provided for (except babassu nuts and kernels), the oils of which are free of duty, and rubber seed, which were free of duty under the Tariff Act of 1922, are free of duty also under the Tariff Act of 1930. The duty-free status of ouricury kernels, muru muru kernels, and tucum kernels was bound in the Geneva agreement. Trade Statistics Table 1.- Miscellaneous oil bearing seeds and nuts: 1/ 1 Does not include babassu nuts and kernels, which are treated in a separate summary. 2/ Preliminary. 3/ Less than 500. Includes Burma in 1937, and Pakistan 1937-47. There were no imports from Pakistan in 1948, the first year for which separate statistics for that country were reported. 5/ Includes 122 thousand pounds, valued at 4 thousand dollars, from the Philippine Republic. Source: Official statistics of the U. S. Department of Commerce. |