In recent years, all countries in the world, especially the industrial developed countries, have regarded the development of fine chemical products as one of the key development strategies for the upgrading and adjustment of the traditional chemical industry structure, and their chemical industry is developing in the direction of "diversification" and "refinement". With the further development of social economy, people's demand for electronics, automobile, machinery industry, new building materials, new energy and new environmental protection materials will further increase, and electronic and information chemicals, surface engineering chemicals and pharmaceutical chemicals will further develop, The global market scale of fine chemicals will maintain a rapid growth rate higher than that of the traditional chemical industry.
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fine chemicals
Fine chemicals refer to chemicals with high technical density, high added value and high purity that can enhance or endow a product with specific functions or have specific functions in small batch manufacturing and application. They are the products of further deep processing of basic chemicals.
In 1986, the former Ministry of chemical industry divided fine chemical products into 11 categories: (1) pesticides; (2) Dyes; (3) Coatings (including paint and ink); (4) Pigments; (5) Reagents and high purity substances; (6) Chemicals for information (including photosensitive materials, magnetic materials and other chemicals that can accept electromagnetic waves); (7) Food and feed additives; (8) Adhesives; (9) Catalysts and various additives; (10) Chemicals (APIs) and daily chemicals (produced by chemical system); (11) Functional polymer materials in polymers (including functional films, polarizing materials, etc.). With the development of national economy, the development and application fields of fine chemicals will continue to expand, and new categories will continue to increase.
Fine chemicals have the following characteristics:
(1) There are many kinds of products and a wide range of applications
There are 40-50 categories and more than 100000 varieties of fine chemicals in the world. Fine chemicals are used in all aspects of daily life, such as medicine, dyes, pesticides, coatings, daily chemical products, electronic materials, papermaking chemicals, inks, food additives, feed additives, water treatment, etc. they are also widely used in aerospace, biotechnology, information technology, new materials, new energy technology, environmental protection and other high and new technologies.
(2) Complex production technology
There are many kinds of fine chemicals. The same intermediate product can extend several or even dozens of derivatives for different purposes through different process flows. The production process is complex and changeable, and the technology is complex. All kinds of fine chemical products need to go through laboratory development, small-scale test, pilot test and then large-scale production. They also need to be updated or improved in time according to the needs of downstream customers. They have high requirements for product quality stability. Enterprises need to constantly improve their processes and accumulate experience in the production process. Therefore, the core competitiveness of a fine chemical enterprise is the derivative development of fine chemical products in subdivided fields, the experience accumulation and innovation ability of production process.
(3) High added value of products
The production process of fine chemical products is long, which needs multiple and multi unit operations, and the manufacturing process is complex. In the production process, mild reaction conditions, safe operating environment, specific chemical reaction and other conditions are met to realize easy separation of chemicals and high product yield, which requires high-level process technology and reaction equipment. Therefore, fine chemical products generally have high added value.
(4) There are many types of compound products
In practical application, fine chemicals appear as the comprehensive function of products, which requires screening different chemical structures in chemical synthesis, giving full play to the function of fine chemicals and the cooperation with other cooperating substances in dosage form production. The demand for fine chemical products in industrial production is diverse, and a single product is difficult to meet the needs of production or use. Taking the water treatment industry where the company is located as an example, the special chemicals used in this field include bactericide and algaecide, scale inhibitor, corrosion inhibitor, flocculant, etc., and the chemical agents for each purpose can be compounded by several chemical agents.
(5) The product has high viscosity to downstream customers
Fine chemical products are generally used in specific areas of industrial production process or to realize specific functions of downstream products. Therefore, users have high requirements for product quality and stability, and are strict with the supplier selection process and standards. Once they enter the supplier list, they will not be easily replaced.
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Classification of fine chemical industry
Fine chemical industry is the general name for the production of fine chemicals industry, referred to as "fine chemical industry", which has the economic characteristics of high added value and high investment profit. The fine chemical industry has high technology intensity, high added value of products, high profit margin, and its development depends on scientific and technological innovation. It is not only the strategic focus of the development of the world chemical industry, but also an important symbol of a country's comprehensive technical level and one of the fastest-growing economic fields.
1. By application field
According to the national economic classification standard, fine chemicals are divided into four sub industries: pesticide manufacturing, coating, ink, pigment and similar products manufacturing, special chemical products manufacturing and daily chemical products manufacturing.
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2. Classification by product category
With the rapid development of China's economy and science and technology after the reform and opening up, China's fine chemical industry has developed rapidly. According to the product category, it can be divided into traditional fields and emerging fields.
(1) Traditional fields of fine chemical industry
The traditional fields of fine chemical industry mainly include pesticides, fertilizers, coatings and other fields. After long-term accumulation, China's fine chemical industry has basically met the needs of national economic development in traditional fields, some products have certain international competitiveness, the output of dyes and pesticides has ranked first in the world, and the output of coatings has reached the fourth in the world.
(2) Emerging fields of fine chemical industry
Fine chemical products in emerging fields have the characteristics of strong specificity and high technical content. The types mainly include food additives, feed additives, adhesives, surfactants, papermaking chemicals, water treatment chemicals, electronic chemicals, etc. At present, the overall technical level of China's fine chemical industry is still relatively low, and a large number of fine chemical products in some emerging fields still need to be imported. The whole industry is in the development stage of optimization and upgrading, and there is still much room for improvement in the fine chemical industry in emerging fields.
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Characteristics of fine chemical industry
1. The fine chemical industry is a manufacturing industry with high industrial relevance with other industries
The industries that are closely related to the fine chemical industry mainly include agriculture, textile industry, construction industry, paper industry, food industry, daily chemical production, electronic equipment, etc. the development of the fine chemical industry is closely related to these industries.
The upstream chemical industry is the main base of fine chemical industry; At the same time, the products provided by the fine chemical industry are the basic raw materials of many other industries, such as agriculture, construction, textile, medicine and other important industries. The development of agriculture, construction, textile, medicine, electronics and other related industries provides an opportunity for the development of fine chemical industry; At the same time, the development of fine chemical industry will also promote the development of upstream industries.
2. The fine chemical industry has certain characteristics of economies of scale
The production scale of foreign fine chemical production enterprises is more than 100000 tons. In the second half of the 20th century, the global fine chemical production enterprises, represented by the United States and Japan, are characterized by large-scale and specialization, so as to continuously reduce production costs. At present, the concentration of China's fine chemical industry is low, the majority of small enterprises, and the proportion of medium-sized and large enterprises, especially large enterprises, is relatively low.
3. Fine chemical industry is an industry with high emission of industrial pollutants
According to the 2012 annual report of environmental statistics, the wastewater discharge of the chemical industry accounts for 16.3% of the national industrial wastewater discharge, ranking the second; The exhaust emission accounts for 6% of the national industrial exhaust emission, ranking fourth; The discharge of solid waste accounts for 5% of the national industrial solid waste discharge, ranking fifth; COD emission accounts for 11.7% of the total industrial COD emission in China, ranking the third.
4. Cyclical characteristics of the industry
The downstream industries targeted by the fine chemical industry mainly include environmental protection plasticizers, powder coatings, insulating materials, high-temperature curing agents and other industries. The end products are applied to all kinds of plastic products, building materials, packaging materials, household appliances, automobile machinery, etc., covering many fields of the national economy. The industry itself does not have obvious cyclical characteristics, However, affected by the macro-economy, it will fluctuate with the change of the overall economic situation. The industry cycle is basically the same as the whole macroeconomic operation cycle.
5. Regional characteristics of the industry
From the regional distribution of enterprises in China's fine chemical industry, the regional pattern of enterprises in the fine chemical industry is obvious, with East China accounting for the largest proportion and North China ranking second.
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6. Seasonal characteristics of the industry
The downstream application fields of fine chemical industry are relatively extensive, and there are no obvious seasonal characteristics on the whole.
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Fine chemical industry barriers
Fine chemical products have many varieties, fast renewal speed, strong specificity and complex production processes, which determines that the main obstacles to entering the industry are technical R & D barriers, environmental protection and safety barriers, sales channel barriers and capital investment barriers.
1. Technical R & D barriers
High end technicians of fine chemical intermediates need not only professional academic background, but also many years of practical experience in R & D and production. There are many kinds of fine chemical intermediates, which need to be adjusted and updated in time according to the needs of downstream pesticides, pharmaceuticals, dyes and other industries. This requires enterprises to have strong R & D capabilities and reserves of new technologies and new varieties.
Technology R & D in fine chemical industry mainly focuses on the selection of new product varieties, chemical reaction process path, catalyst selection, temperature, pressure, time and other process control. Different R & D paths and process choices have great differences on product cost, purity, quality and subsequent expansion. Therefore, having a large number of high-end and mature professional and technical talents is very important for the sustainable development of the company. The fine chemical industry also has very high requirements for crystallization separation technology, distillation and purification technology, chromatographic inspection technology, safe operation technology and pollutant treatment technology, so enterprises need to be equipped with corresponding professional production and technical workers.
To sum up, in order to enter the market and develop for a long time, fine chemical enterprises must have strong product R & D ability and long-term production technology accumulation, which constitute the technical barriers of the industry.
2. Environmental protection and safety barriers
In the production process of fine chemicals, harmful substances such as wastewater, waste gas and solid waste will be produced. Enterprises need to invest a lot of money in the treatment of these harmful substances to make their production meet the national environmental protection standards. With the increasing improvement of national environmental protection standards, enterprises must continue to increase the R & D of pollutant treatment technology, investment in environmental protection facilities and pollutant disposal.
At the same time, some raw materials and intermediate products used in the production process are flammable, explosive, toxic and other dangerous chemicals. There are safety risks such as leakage, flammability and explosion in the chemical reaction in the production process. If employees violate the safety operation procedures, resulting in changes in reaction path, temperature, concentration and pressure exceeding the safety standards, or serious aging and disrepair of equipment, explosion, leakage, fire and other safety accidents may occur, resulting in casualties and property losses of the company. The company needs to continuously invest in safe production processing technology and safety protection.
In conclusion, the continuous strengthening of environmental protection and safety requirements and the increasing investment in environmental protection and safety of enterprises constitute environmental protection and safety barriers in the fine chemical industry.
3. Sales channel barriers
Fine chemical intermediate products are highly specialized and need to establish specific sales channels. Whether they can maintain long-term business cooperation with customers will have a significant impact on the daily operation and long-term development of the enterprise. The quality and purity of fine chemical intermediates directly affect the performance and quality of end products. Multinational comprehensive chemical enterprises such as BASF Group and Korea Cologne company have quite strict requirements on the production scale, product quality and sustainable operation ability of suppliers, usually from the aspects of research and development ability, product quality The main suppliers of one or more intermediates can only be determined after comprehensive investigation and evaluation of relevant intermediate manufacturers in terms of environmental protection measures and occupational health, and regular review, rating / audit can be carried out.
Therefore, once a fine chemical intermediate enterprise is selected as a supplier, it will usually form a stable cooperative relationship with large downstream customers. Specific sales channels and strict qualification requirements constitute a strong sales channel barrier for new entrants.
4. Capital investment barriers
With the increasing improvement of China's environmental protection policies, production safety policies and employee welfare policies, as well as the increasingly strict import standards of fine chemical intermediates by developed countries such as the United States and Europe, the entry threshold of fine chemical intermediates industry is becoming higher and higher. All these require large investment by fine chemical intermediate manufacturers in environmental protection, safety, product R & D and business scale, As a result, its initial and continuous investment continues to rise. Small fine chemical enterprises without scale and technical advantages will be phased out by the market.
Therefore, the increasing requirements for fixed assets and R & D investment constitute a capital barrier to entering the industry.
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Introduction to industrial chain of fine chemical industry
Fine chemical industry is an important pillar industry of the national economy. The upstream includes petroleum, ore and other production raw materials, while the downstream includes agriculture, textile industry, construction industry, paper industry, food industry, daily chemical production, electronic equipment and many other industries. Fine chemical industry involves many fields in the national economy and has a high strategic position.