CCM: Will glyphosate lose out to glufosinate-ammonium after paraquat AS exits Chinese market 09-09-2016

Paraquat AS will soon exit the Chinese market on 1 July, 2016. As two most potential substitutes for paraquat, glyphosate and glufosinate-ammonium are going to compete against each other for market shares left by paraquat AS. So will glyphsoate lose out to glufosinate-ammonium?



                                                                                    Source: Baidu


Given that paraquat AS is about to be banned in China, some industry insiders believed that glyphosate will lose out to glufosinate-ammonium when seizing the market shares left by paraquat. As of now, glyphsoate still plays an important role in the sterilant herbicide market. Nevertheless, as the problems of overcapacity, fierce competition among enterprises and resistance of weeds become more and more obvious, the use of glyphosate is impacted to some extent.


In general, weeds will easy to become resistant to a herbicide that has been used alone for 3-5 years. Therefore, weeds are showing serious resistance to glyphosate as glyphosate has been used for decades. Currently, some weeds like mazus japonicus, common dayflower, youngia japonica, purslane, cudweed herb, copperleaf, field bindweed and endive  are largely insensitive to glyphosate, as a result, to use glyphosate formulations alone cannot effectively control and prevent them.


Notably, in 2006 and 2010, some Chinese magazines also reported that Canadian fleabane and Eleusine indica (L.) Gaertn. were resistant to glyphosate. In fact, some weeds are naturally resistant to glyphosate, thay are Chinese jute, ammannia, China pink, conyza japonica, cyperus esculentus, common crabgrass, ipomoea bata, belvedere, knotweed, Florida calla, hemp sesbania, common chickweed, and black nightshade. 



                                                                          

In recent years, glyphosate is losing its advantage, mainly because it is reported to cause cancer by media. At the same time, it was suspected to be carcinogenic by the International Agency for Research on Cancer and the European Food Safety Authority. The public began to worry about the use of glyphosate, especially when there is growing concern over food safety.


What's worse, the mother liquor generating from glyphosate production pollutes the environment, which also affects the sale of glyphosate. Particularly, some enterprises are reported to discharge glyphosate mother liquor illegally in recent years. This causes negative moods of the public towards the continued use of glyphosate.

 
On the contrary, some industry insiders believed that glufosinate-ammonium cannot beat glyphosate, because the latter won't be eliminated from the Chinese market in the short run. On one hand, the price of glyphosate TC is about USD2,731.87/t (RMB18,000/t), vs. USD18,212.45/t (RMB120,000/t) for glufosinate-ammonium TC.


In fact, when glufosinate-ammonium was promoted in the market, the huge price gap between it and glyphosate was there. On the other hand, being marketed for many years, glyphosate has been accepted by farmers. Therefore, this will be an obstacle for the promotion of glufosinate-ammonium.


Furthermore, being mixed with other herbicides revitalizes glyphosate. Some obstinate weeds can be control and prevent and the weeding efficacy can be improved by using mixed formulations of glyphosate. Nowadays, glyphosate is mainly mixed by MCPA, dicamba, 2,4-D, fluoroglycofen-ethyl, oxyfluorfen, bensulfuron-methyl, triclopyr, fluroxypyr, fluazifop-P-butyl and pyraflufen-ethyl. These mixed formulations all sell well in the market.

 

This article comes from Glyphosate China Monthly Report 1606, CCM




About CCM:

CCM is the leading market intelligence provider for China’s agriculture, chemicals, food & ingredients and life science markets. Founded in 2001, CCM offers a range of data and content solutions, from price and trade data to industry newsletters and customized market research reports. Our clients include Monsanto, DuPont, Shell, Bayer, and Syngenta. CCM is a brand of Kcomber Inc.

 

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Tag: paraquat  glyphosate

 

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