On 6 Dec 2012, China’s Ministry of Agriculture and Ministry of Health co-published the “Maximum Residue Limits for Pesticides in Food(GB 2763-2012)”, which will be uniquely and compulsorily implemented from 1 Mar 2013. Meanwhile, other 6 national standards and 10 industrial standards regarding pesticide MRLs will be repealed from then on.

The 11th plenary session of the 8th National Expert Committee for Pesticide Registration was concluded in Urumqi on 18th August. The experts have reviewed the submissions for full ICAMA registration. DuPont’s novel insecticide cyantraniliprole failed to convince the experts because of its effect on bee.

On November 16th, 2012, the Institute for the Control of Agrochemicals, Ministry of Agriculture (ICAMA) has published a notice on its website announcing that the qualifications of 6 paraquat emergency agencies have been approved.

A seminar regarding China’s pesticide regulation was held by the ICAMA (the Institute for the Control of Agrochemicals, Ministry of Agriculture) in Hangzhou on Nov 12nd and 13rd. GuBaogen, the deputy director of the ICAMA, together with other government officials in the pesticide management field , have presented detailed information on the new “Regulation on Management of Agricultural Chemicals” and explained their preliminary thoughts on data requirements in the dossiers.

Recently, General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine (AQSIQ) has published the results of random checkings on the fertilizer products. The heads of the sub-standard companies were summoned to have a talk with AQSIQ.

  The ICAMA (Institute for the control of Agrochemicals, Ministry of Agriculture) has examined the paraquat emergency agencies’ qualification in dealing with herbicide-related incidents.

On October 10th, 2012, China Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM) has published importing quotas of fertilizer for FY2013. Totally 13.65 million tons of fertilizer will be alloted to domestic importing companies, consisting of 3.3 million tons of urea, 6.9 million tons of DAP, and 3.45 million tons of compound fertilizer.

Late last month in Nanjing, Sui Pengfei, director of the ICAMA (Institute for the control of Agrochemicals, Ministry of Agriculture) revealed in an industrial conference that China to issue new regulation for pesticide and the legal text will be promulgated by December 2012 the latest.

There are four correlated regulations are available for the agrochemical companies to maintain their intellectual properties in China. However due to China’s backward IP protection system and different interpretations by different competent authorities, patent protection is increasingly favored by  MNCs and Chinese companies. 

On 21st September, 2012, the Chinese Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM) has announced on its website to launch anti-dumping investigation against the pyridine imported from Japan and India. The decision was made under the petition from four major pesticide companies. On August 2nd, 2012, Anhui Guoxing Biochem, Nanjing Redsun, Weifang Lvba and Nantong Ruili Chemicals have jointly filed a complaint with the MoC, alleging dumping of pyridine from Japanese and Indian Manufacturers.