Chinese Seed Treatment Registration Watch in 2012

By CnAgri Print China registered 337 seed treatment products up to Dec. 2012, accounting for 1.35% of total pesticide products. The market is dominated by products focused on hot crops like corn, wheat, cotton, soybean, rice, peanuts, lacking of products for minor crops including vegetable, gardening, and horticulture plants. Suspended seed coating is the main formulation for domestic market. Overall, seed treatment in China is still in a preliminary stage.  
 
Table 1 reveals that the existing registrations are relatively centralized , numbers of registration of main products accounting for over 50% of total registration. Thiram•carbofuran, carbendazim•thiram•carbofuran, carbofuran•carbendazim, and phorate•carbofuran have been registered in large numbers, but no new registration has been approved after year 2009 due to the highly toxic ingredient carbofuran they contain. Imidacloprid and tebuconazole are the two hot products for registration, showing a good potential in the coming years.
 
Table 1:Top 10 Registered Seed Treatment

More seed treatment registrations have been applied and are in the process of field trials. It is estimated that the number of registration of seed treatment will double to some 700 in the coming 2-3 years.

As per statistics, the most popular products applied for registration are imidacloprid, thiamethoxam, difenoconazole, tebuconazole, fipronil, among which, thiamethoxam is a star product owing to its wide spectrum efficiency and low toxicity. 

 Figure 1: Application numbers of Top 5 products in year 2010, 2011, 2012