Fipronil, prices increasing: no margin in the distribution chain in Brazil

Date:01-24-2018

Fipronil is an excellent insecticide/termiticide used in quite reduced doses through treatment of seeds, leaf spraying and bait.

The first registration in Brazil is from 1994. Today, there are 43 approved registrations, among them, 21 in the WG formulation and 17 in the FS/SC formulation. BASF, market leader, holds 17 registrations.

From the neonicotinoid chemical group, fipronil is listed in the environmental re-evaluation promoted by IBAMA, one of the agencies responsible for registration of agricultural chemicals together with ANVISA and MAPA. Soon, as of the beginning of the re-evaluation, the processes for registration of fipronil shall be stopped, as for imidacloprid, thiamethoxam and clothianidin. It has been foreseen that the re-evaluation is completed, their use will be quite restricted.

Despite of the low doses applied, the import of fipronil totalized US$ 99 million and US$ 126 million in 2016 and 2017, respectively. For the next imports, it is expected the total imported volume to increase significantly because of the unprecedent increase of the prices.

With the purpose to allow better understanding of the Brazilian market, AllierBrasil, consulting firm for product registration and agribusiness, has prepared an extensive survey of data related to import of all agricultural chemical products. This information is an important tool to take decisions, whether for selection of suppliers, comparison of prices of the same manufacturer for different distributors, or to identify import, whose origin is out of context, for example.

For fipronil, it indicates that the market is much bigger than the estimated by then. A brief summary shows the following:

Import of fipronil (2017 and 2016)
Especification	Country of origin				TOTAL		YEAR
	China		India, Israel, France		TOTAL
	Kg or L (000)	US$ (000)	Kg or L (000)	US$ (000)	Kg or L (000)	US$ (000)
Techical grade (≥ 95%)	235	17,400	(*)	91,534	(*)	108,934	2017
Techical grade (≥ 95%)	244	15,775	(*)	72,652	(*)	88,427	2016
800 WG	48	3.143	(*)	6,302	(*)	14,061	2017
800 WG	142	6,623	-	-	142	6,623	2016
250 FS	149.9	3,560	-	-	149.9	3,560	2017
250 FS	119.7	4,216	-	-	119.7	4,216	2016

(1) Complete data available in report “Brazilian Import of Agricultural Chemicals”.

Source: “Brazilian Import of Agricultural Chemicals”, AllierBrasil Consulting, January 2018.

Unlike most agrochemical products, the biggest supplier of fipronil is not China. Although the Chinese technical product is the origin of most imported formulated products, there are records of import of formulated products coming from India, and it can be deduced that technical product has been exported from China to India for further export to Brazil, which would tend to increase the end price of the product.

The price FOB/kg of the import from some countries other than China calls attention; these are at least more than double the price when compared to the prices from China.

These so expressive differences of the prices could indicate that the prices in field still enable reasonable profitability considering the volume of import at prices extremely higher than the Chinese. However, this is quite controversial, considering the narrow margin in the whole distribution chain.

The complete data per exporting country, FOB price, quantity, importer, year/month, is a part of the survey “Brazilian Import of Agricultural Chemicals”, by AllierBrasil Consulting, updated monthly.

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