Pesticides are entering an era where quality comes first.

In recent years, the pesticide market has seen countless small and medium-sized pesticide companies choosing to merge and restructure. This is mainly to improve the pesticide research and development technology of enterprises and ensure the quality of pesticide products. The pesticide industry has officially entered an era where quality is paramount.
The annual "Two Sessions" serve as a barometer for the future development of various industries in our country. At this year's "Two Sessions," Premier Keqiang included the "Quality Era" in the government work report and held the first "Quality Improvement" press conference this year.
At the press conference, Director Zhi Ping of the State Administration for Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine proposed: to make the pursuit of quality, the emphasis on quality, and the creation of quality a social trend. He emphasized that in order to improve quality, it is necessary to place quality in a strategic position and comprehensively carry out quality improvement actions guided by strategy, focusing on one industry and one product at a time, while laying a solid foundation. This includes enhancing the internationally recognized national quality technical foundation in measurement, standards, certification, and inspection.
The "Quality Era" of Chinese Pesticides
Since China joined the WTO in 2001, many rules of the game have been established globally, such as CIPAC/FAO/WHO, leading to technical barriers like GLP testing standards, product standards, pesticide residue standards, and patent protection, which pose significant challenges to the development of China's pesticide industry. The FAO/WHO pesticide standards are recognized as authoritative world standards in the pesticide industry and have become the international benchmark for assessing pesticide product quality. The formulation of new FAO/WHO pesticide standards has been monopolized by large foreign pesticide companies as an important technical means of industry competition and a major form of non-tariff barriers in international trade. Most Chinese pesticides are primarily imitations, with the vast majority lacking independent intellectual property rights. In terms of exports, Chinese pesticides tend to have many customized products and few independent brands, with overseas registration being one of the biggest technical bottlenecks for domestic companies going abroad. Many products encounter numerous clauses during registration, hindering their market entry timing and affecting promotion and sales; raw pesticide products are exported at low prices, and buyers process them into formulations and sell them at high prices under their own brands, earning profits several times that of the raw pesticide companies.
In recent years, nearly 80% of pesticide products have adopted major international standards and advanced international methods. As the pace of Chinese pesticides going global accelerates, domestic export companies are increasingly eager to understand the rules for formulating relevant international product standards. Actively participating in the formulation of international pesticide quality standards is beneficial for improving the level of pesticide standard formulation, promoting the alignment of pesticide quality standards with international standards, enhancing the international status of Chinese pesticides, and expanding international trade; it is also conducive to breaking through the bottleneck of overseas registration and promoting the establishment and creation of Chinese brands.
Since 2010, domestic pesticide companies have significantly accelerated their participation in the formulation of FAO/WHO international pesticide standards. By 2016, Chinese companies had applied for a total of 13 FAO/WHO standards, accounting for 34% of the total global standard applications. By the end of 2016, five units had 10 product standards approved by JMPS experts, which can be queried on the FAO and WHO official websites. The attitude and actions of Chinese companies in actively participating in the formulation of international rules and striving for discourse power in the international market are evident.
It can be said that Chinese pesticide products have a wide variety, high quality, and meet the basic conditions for applying for international standards. To help domestic pesticide companies apply for and participate in the formulation of FAO/WHO pesticide standards and CIPAC methods more规范 and efficiently, at the end of 2014, with the encouragement and assistance of CIPAC/FAO/WHO, the China Pesticide Industry Association took the lead in establishing the CIPAC/FAO/WHO branch in China - CHIPAC (Chinese Pesticide Advisory Committee), responsible for overall coordination, providing comprehensive services for enterprises, and facilitating the application for international standards.