Africa Watch: Mesotrione becomes South Africa's top 1 imported pesticide product from China in 2019

Recently, our contacts from Africa asked about the progress of African agricultural, to help them select and store products, find reliable partners and serve local agriculture better in the future. Based on their requirements, we will publish a series of articles focusing on Africa’s leading products and related events.

As per the statistics of China Pesticide Exporting Analysis, South Africa imported 30,395,432.27 kilograms of pesticides from China in 2019, decreasing 16.2% from 2018’s figure of 36,376,580.74 kilograms, while the value of imported pesticides in 2019 was $189,201,607.00, decreasing 18.4% compared to $231,919,244.85 in 2018. However, the import quantity of the herbicide, Mesotrione, reached 505,907.80 kilograms in 2019, while its import quantity in 2018 was only 326,504.00 kilograms. The import value of Mesotrione also increased from $8,090,080.00 to $14,020,374.00. Mesotrione was South Africa’s seventh leading import product in 2018, but it becomes the top import pesticide variety in South Africa in 2019.

Top 20 pesticides South Africa imported from China in 2019

Formulation Type Analysis

In 2018, South Africa’s imports were almost all technicals, and only a small amount of Mesotrione formulations was imported (<5%). But in 2019, the amount of imported Mesotrione formulations reached over 20%, with the proportion of Mesotrione 480g/L SC import rose to 18%. Other import formulations include Mesotrione 10% OD, Mesotrione 75% WG and Mesotrione 15% SC.

Formulation type ranking of Mesotrione in South Africa imported from China in 2019

Price Trend Analysis

The overall price trend was stable in 2019, and the highest purchases occurred in February and July 2019.

Price trend of Mesotrione 98% TC in South Africa imported from China in 2019

Price trend of Mesotrione 95% TC in South Africa imported from China in 2019

Price trend of Mesotrione 480g/L SC in South Africa imported from China in 2019

Suppliers Analysis

China has enhanced its monitoring of environmental protection and enterprise production safety in recent years, and some small companies have closed because they cannot afford the high cost of environmental governance. Chinese suppliers exporting Mesotrione to South Africa are dominated by a few large companies and have not changed much, with the top three accounting for over 60% of the market.

Questions

- What do you think about the change to the importation of Mesotrione?
- Which product’s importation do you want to know about next?
- Which African country’s importation do you want to know about next?