AgroPages-China’s pesticide export looks up; amide herbicides, pyrethroids lead recovery-Agricultural news

Report

Market and Competitive Analysis of Dicamba Industry in China 2016

With stringent environmental regulation being implemented in China from the second half of 2016, large number of factories have been either shut down or their production capacity has been restricted, which has led to a sharp rise in the prices of raw materials and intermediates, resulting in short supply and price rise of technical material. Since 2017, agrochemical prices and global food price indexes have both hit bottom and appeared to climb again. The destocking of agrochemical multinationals has basically come to an end, and a new round of stock replenishment has begun. In China, the export of pesticides has started to show recovery.

In 2017 so far, China’s pesticide technical export hit a record high in January and February. According to the export statistics by Customs, the pesticide export volume in January and February reached 256,000 tons, 28.9 percent up year-on-year, while the value of export reached $681 million, 20 percent up year-on-year.

	Volume (000 tons)	Y-O-Y Change (%)	Value ($ million)	Y-O-Y Change (%)
Pesticide	256	28.9	681.00	20.0
Insecticide	41	23.1	150.83	22.8
Fungicide	17	14.7	84.40	15.4
Herbicide	190	31.1	426.66	19.6

The increase in export over the last year is typically reflected in herbicides such as paraquat, acetochlor, butachlor, acetochlor and imazethapyr; insecticides such as pymetrozine, bifenthrin, trichlorfon, dichlorvos and acetamiprid; and fungicides such as carbendazim, thiophanate-methyl, difenoconazole and fluorinated pyrazole.

Of the herbicides, the export of glyphosate, 2,4-D and glufosinate technical declined but the value of export increased due to a rise in the unit price. Among other varieties, amide herbicides became the focus of attention, where the export of both ipratropium and butachlor doubled. Acetochlor increased 83 percent, paraquat technical concentrate increased 42 percent and mesotrione increased 41 percent.

Concerning insecticides, the export of imidacloprid dropped to a certain extent, but the value of export remained same due to a sharp rise in the unit price. Pyrethroids stood out prominently, with both bifenthrin and cyhalothrin doubling their export volume and value.

As regards to fungicides, the export of chlorothalonil somewhat decreased, but the value of export increased 1 percent due to a rise in the unit price. The remaining fungicides, such as azoxystrobin, carbendazim, thiophanate-methyl, difenoconazole and fluorinated pyrazole increased significantly. Dimethomorph even increased four times.