Demand Increases for New Fungicides for Rice    

After June this year China's regions growing middle and late rice had widespread blast and sheath/culm blight. Such diseases plagued 19.2 million hectares. Starting from July the market for new fungicides that can control blast and sheath/culm blight for rice was more and more active.
   Makers of traditional pesticides for the control of blast have to contend with fierce competition from new pesticides in market this year. Kitazine, iprobenfos, isoprothiolane and tricyclazole, often used by farmers in the past, are gradually being replaced by new varieties with high potency, broad spectrum and low toxicity such as carbgendazim/sulfur blend, ethylicin, kresoxim-methyl, albendazole, tetramycoin, carbgendazim/tricyclazole/validamycin blend, probenazole and kasugamycin. Farmers think that traditional pesticides have a single simple effect, bacteria have developed resistance due to long-time use and the effectiveness of such pesticides has therefore been steadily falling off.
   There was more rainfall in various provinces in May and June this year compared with previous years, creating favorable conditions for sheath/culm blight in rice. Validamycin is the most successful biological fungicide developed by China for the control of sheath/culm blight in rice. Nevertheless, it has already been used for more than 30 years. Its effectiveness has declined and its output is now also dropping rapidly. The output of 5% validamycin formulation in China was 30 000-40 000 tons annually before 2009, covering an area over 10 million hectares. A new broad-spectrum biological fungicide called polyoxin B has made up for defects of validamycin in recent years. Its production cost is identical to validamycin. Polyoxin B has therefore become a new fungicide for the control of sheath/culm blight in rice. Japan and China are major producers of polyoxin B. It is one of the biggest-selling agricultural antibiotics in the world today. The potential global market can reach several billion RMB a year.
   Faced with the big market for the control of sheath/culm blight in rice, many enterprises have developed new compound formulations. Examples include validamycin/bacillus cereus suspension developed by Shanghai Nongle Biological Products Co Ltd, validamycin/tricyclazole wettable powder of Jiangsu Taicang Changjiang Chemical Plant, validamycin/tricyclazole suspension emulsifiable agent made by Kunshan Dingfeng Pesticide Co Ltd, validamycin/osthole wettable powder made by Liyang Zhongnan Chemical Industry Co Ltd and validamycin/hexaconazole wettable powder compounded by Nanjing Huiyu Agrochemicals Co Ltd. These products all sell well. Among fungicides, prochloraz and tebuconazole have won high praise in the market. Both are potent fungicides with low toxicity and are mainly used to control sheath/culm blight, blast and false smut/green smut in rice. Owing prochloraz's effectiveness, market demand for it is increasing year on year. Due to impacts from the global financial crisis and reduced prochloraz export volume, its market price was down to RMB58 000 per ton in July, a drop of 3.62% from the price of RMB60 100 per ton in the same period of last year. The market price of 25% tebuconazole was around RMB70 000 per ton in July, a drop of RMB5 000 per ton or 7.69% from one year ago.
   Among imported pesticides, owing to their good effect in the control of blast and sheath/culm blight in rice, tebuconazole, a new triazole fungicide made by Bayer, and a difenoconazole/propiconazole blend from Syngenta have both enjoyed good sales without big price fluctuations.