China pesticide exports rose by 8.4% to some 8.523 Billion USD in 2013, according to figures compiled by the Institute for the Control of Agrochemicals, MoA (China ICAMA). That compares with exports totaling some 7.86 Billion USD in 2012. Though imports jumped by 23% to 698 million USD, China still maintains a considerable trade surplus of 7.8 Billion USD in the pesticide sector.
Export volume increased from 1.599 million tons to 1.622 million tons and Glyphosate contributed more than a third of the total export volume. Compared with the statistic from the NBS (National Bureau of Statistics), China produced 3.18 million tons of pesticide, reflecting growth of just 1.64% compared with the previous year. Chinese producers have invested heavily in glyphosate due to a massive increase in global demand reflected by a staggering 50% increase in exports(see Chemlinked News Release on 23 Jul).
Year | Import/export | Volume (000 tones) | Change (%) | Value(million USD) | Change (%) |
2011 | export | 1,409 | / | 6,198.8 | / |
2011 | import | 43.9 | / | 52.1 | / |
2012 | export | 1,599 | 13.53 | 7,863 | 26.85 |
2012 | import | 53.5 | 21.79 | 56.4 | 8.24 |
2013 | export | 1,622 | 1.4 | 8,523 | 8.4 |
2013 | import | 76* | 42 | 69.8 | 23.75 |
*the 2013 import volume was obtained from the Customs. | |||||
In terms of volume and value glyphosate is by far the most exported active ingredient, followed by paraquat and imidacloprid. Glyphosate makes up 27.77% of the total value of all exports and accounts for 37.11% of total export volume. 14 active ingredients exceeded 10 million USD in imports a figure which is primarily accounted for by importation of the following substances: chlorantraniliprole, penoxsulam and tebuconazole. Primary export destinations were Asia and Latin America while nearly 90% of the imports were from Europe and Asia.
Glyphosate Exportation | ||||
Year | Volume (000 tones) | Percentage of total export volume (%) | Value(million USD) | Percentage of total export value (%) |
2012 | 389.685 | 24.37 | 1427.27 | 18.15 |
2013 | 601.92 | 37.11 | 2366.83 | 27.11 |
Change (%) | +55 | +52 | +65.8 | +49.37 |
The Top 12 pesticide exporting provinces/municipalities accounted for 94.6% of total export volume and 96.6% of the total export value and the three pesticide manufacturing provinces, Jiangsu, Zhejiang and Shandong accounted for 76.6% and 76.1% of the volume and value respectively.
In fact, the dependency of China on global markets is even greater than figures suggest. As the actual production volume is usually overestimated by the NBS and the ICAMA who generate figures using calculations that include all formulated products and technical materials. If calculated solely on an active-ingredients basis, over 60% of all agrochemicals are produced for export.
