Feed additive production enters maintenance season, China sees covid-19 clusters and severe flooding
While some single products were under price pressure recently, the Swiss-based market specialists said they would be deferring comment on such events to the end of August to allow buying trends to play out.
L-Threonine authorization in the EU
A recent development flagged by the analysts was the European Commission authorization of the use of L-Threonine from Escherichia coli CGMCC 11473.
“Our members were notified exclusively that the producer using such a strain is the Fufeng Group and that a reputable company obtained exclusive agency for the most important European countries,” Stefan Schmidinger, partner, Kemiex, told FeedNavigator.
Maintenance season
Maintenance season is definitely underway, he added.
Zhejiang Pharmaceutical (ZMC) is on maintenance from August 1 to September 15 for vitamin A, vitamin E and vitamin D. Lonza is closing its vitamin B3 factories for maintenance - the Visp facility in Switzerland will shut for four weeks during October and that company's production plant in Nansha, China will close for eight weeks, from mid-September to mid-November.
In terms of vitamin C production, China’s Luwei is expanding its output of derivatives, sodium and calcium, said Kemiex.
Noting how Novus has filed anti-dumping complaints in the US amid increased methionine imports into the US from Spain, France and Japan, along with low pricing of such imports, the Swiss platform also reported that Evonik recently announced a price increase for DL-methionine in China (RMB 1.5/kg or 5-10%).
Meanwhile, the market specialists outlined how, in the US, Food and Drug Administration (FDA) inspections for both food and feed facilities have resumed after what was a four-month pause.
China: Certificates, covid-19 clusters, flooding
In other developments of note, early July saw the FAMI-QS certificate of Henan Lvyuan Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. (FAM-1350), a China-based producer of vitamin C and amoxicillin, withdrawn by the certification body, but without any comment on the reason why.
“There are also media reports of potential disruption to amino acid production in China, but, in our view, all is operating as normal in that market,” said Schmidinger.
So while the regions of Dalian, Jilin and Urumchi enter ‘wartime’ mode to battle infection clusters, production, transport and the main seaports remain unaffected, he stressed.
He also noted the flooding in China in June and early July but said there was no known impact to supply chains. The massive rainfall that occurred in recent weeks caused flooding of the Yangtze, Yellow and Huai rivers, with some 54m people affected and US$20bn in economic losses for 27 provincial regions, including eastern Anhui and Jiangxi.
Meanwhile, Kemiex said it has launched a new pricing analytics tool to compare price trends of more than 23 products and help clients with strategic decision making and risk management.
