On 24 April, 2012, the Ministry of Agriculture of China (MOA) issued an announcement, namely Announcement No. 1745, deciding to take restrictive measures on the production and sales of paraquat, aiming to ensure the safety of production and use of paraquat in China, based on CCM International’s latest issue of Crop Protection China News.
According to the announcement, the Chinese government will stop the approval of new plants for paraquat TK and formulation processing. The application for new field trial, registration and production permit will be ceased. The approval of registration and production permit of paraquat TK and aqueous products will also be terminated.
The registration and production permit of paraquat aqueous products will be revoked and all the production of these products shall be terminated from 1 July, 2014 , only maintaining the registration and production of paraquat aqueous products for export and use in foreign countries. From 1 July, 2016, policies of the all-out ban on the sales and use of paraquat aqueous products in China will be fully carried out.
Aiming to ensure the safe use of paraquat and provide a better after-sale service for poisoning treatment, several measures are proposed in the announcement to protect the users.
Emergency treatment telephone number and warnings shall be added in an eye-catching position of the labels on the products. Pesticide registration license and pesticide production permit document shall also be re-checked and added up the content of the name of paraquat TK production enterprise. Pesticide companies shall finish all these tasks before 1 Jan., 2013. Those products with initial labels which are already on sale are allowed to be sold until 31 Dec., 2013.
Moreover, the announcement requests paraquat producers to add in sufficient quantity of emetic, stench and colorant into their products. Providing good after-sale services such as use guide and poisoning treatment are also encouraged.
Although the rumor of banning paraquat has been spreading in China since the 4th China High-Level Forum on Pesticides held on 23 to 24 Sept., 2011, the release of the announcement still surprised many people in China. They believed that medium and small sized paraquat producers will suffer greatly, but those large ones will gain benefit.
"As most of the medium and small sized paraquat producers are technical suppliers of domestic formulation enterprises, their domestic market share will be lost after the ban on paraquat AS. But for those large enterprises, such as Nanjing Redsun Co., Ltd. (Nanjing Redsun) and Shandong Luba Chemical Co., Ltd. whose paraquat products are mainly produced for export will not be much affected," said Wei Ping, Product Manager of Nanjing Redsun.
Despite those enterprises will be affected by the ban on paraquat AS, peasants' interests may also be largely impacted. As far as it is concerned, it is still a problem that no good substitute for paraquat AS has been found. Even if there will be some new kind of paraquat formulation found in the future, the price of the product will not be as cheap as that of paraquat AS. Whether domestic peasants are willing to undertake a higher cost of using higher-priced herbicides or not is still a problem.
Source: Crop Protection China News 1209
http://www.cnchemicals.com/Newsletter/NewsletterDetail_16.html
Content of Crop Protection China News 1209:
Chinato further restrict paraquat
Chinato support development of small-sized enterprises
Hubei Sanonda's reorganization plan released
Huapont to acquire 49% equities of Wanquan Hongyu
Zhejiang Wynca sees deficit in Q1 2012
CCPIA International Trade Committee founded
Pesticide formulation industry needs to make transformation
Chinato vigorously develop urban modern agriculture
Hunanruns pesticide industry base bigger and stronger
Crop Protection China News, a semimonthly publication issued by CCM International on 15th and 30th(31st) of every month, aims to gain a deep insight into Chinese market, supply the latest market data and strategy support, analyze the newest legislation and policy and grasp the future market trend.
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