Japan agrochemical sales up 5% in H1 2013
By CnAgri
Print
Sales of Japanese agrochemicals increased 4.8% compared with the same period of previous year to 221,182 million yen ($2,234 million at the current rate) in the first half fiscal year of 2013 which ended March 31st, according to the Japan Crop Protection Association. Sales volume of agrochemicals in the first half year slipped slightly by 1.3% to 114,707 tons.Major categories all archived sales growth in value in the first half year. Herbicides held first place in sales value among all categories, with sales reaching 82,066 million yen ($829 million), up by 8.0%, followed by insecticides, with sales 59,568 million yen ($602 million), up by 1.7%. Fungicides rose by 1.2% to 47,513 million yen ($480 million). Insecticides/fungicides category posted the largest growth by 11.2% to 26,455 million yen ($267 million). For sales volume, herbicides increased by 2.5% to 37,151 tons, and insecticides/fungicides were up by 1% to 36,238 tons. The other two categories declined both by 3.6% (insecticides) and 4.4% (fungicides), respectively.
The sales value for the paddy-field application category was 85,084 million yen ($859 million), up by 4.4% and volume down by 1.3% to 42,852 tons. Sales value for agrochemicals used in fruit trees also grew by 4.9% to 36,060 million yen ($364 million) and volume dropped by 0.6% to 14,342 tons. It's worth mentioning that sale of rodenticides suffered significant declines which over 90% both in value and volume in the first half year.
