Economic Performance of Nationwide Industries and Chemical Pharmaceutical Industry in China

This report has been released at 63^rd API China & INTERPHEX China Conference Program (November 2009).

China has taken a series of macroeconomic-control measures since the fourth quarter of last year, initially curbing the decline momentum of economic growth, thus leading to the appearance of change towards stability and turn-around to enterprises. According to the State Statistics Bureau, the added value of enterprises with nationwide standing and above increased in January-August 2009, with 12.3% year-on-year increase in August and a total increase of 8.1% in January-August period, and 2 percentage points above that of January-May period; revenue of main business amounted to 32376.8 billion Yuan, showing the first increase in the year with a comparative growth of 1.6 %; realized  profit was 1674.6 billion Yuan, comparatively 10.6% lower, and the drop rate was 11 percentage points lower than that of January-May period; realized delivery value was 4479.2 billion Yuan, comparatively dropping 15.4%, with no obvious change as compared to January-May data.

With the national economy showing sign of improvement, the difference between the major economic index of pharmaceutical industry and the national industrial average narrowed. In January-August 2009, pharmaceutical industry had a total of 13.3% year-on-year increase, which was 5.2 percentage points higher than the national average, and 3.3 percentage points lower that of the January-May data; revenue of the main business amounted to 606.8 billion Yuan, which was a year-on-year growth of 17.8% and 16 percentage points higher than the national average, maintaining the growth rate of January-May period; realized profit amounted to 59.2 billion Yuan, comparatively increased 16%, with the growth rate of 2 percentage points less than that in January-May, and was nearly 27 percentage points higher than the national average, but decreased 13 percentage points as compared to the 40 percentage points in January-May period; realized export delivery value was worth 65.5 billion Yuan, which was 4% increase year-on-year, and 0.6 percentage points lower than that in January-May, and was still 20 percentage points higher than the national average. 

In the sub-industry of the pharmaceutical industry, only the profit growth rate of chemical pharmacy and pharmaceutical machinery was lower than the industrial average, and the profit growth of the rest of the sub-industry was higher than the mean value, particularly the industry of Chinese medicine in tablet form, biological and biochemical products, and hygienic stuff having the increase rate of more than 10 percentage points higher than the average, rose 35.9%, 26.6% and 39.2% respectively.

The three major Key Performance Indicators (KPI) of the chemical pharmacy were all lower than the industrial average. Revenue of the main business amounted to 296.8 billion Yuan, which was a comparative increase of 14.6%, and 1.8 percentage points higher than that of January-May, but 3.2 percentage points lower than industry average; realized profit of 28 billion Yuan gave a comparative increase of 8.6%, but maintained the same level as that in January-May, and 7 percentage points lower than the increase rate of the industrial average; realized delivery value of 32 billion Yuan was a comparative drop of 5.3%, and 1.1 percentage points above the drop rate in January-May, and 9.3 percentage points lower than the increase rate of the industrial average. 

Relying on the rebound of the price in bulk pharmaceutical chemicals in the international market, industries with production and export of pharmaceutical chemicals as main business had more substantial profit growth last year. In January-August this year, there was a comparative drop of 5.3% in profit, export provision had a comparative drop of 3.8%, which was 9 percentage points lower than the industrial average; the drop rate of profit and export provision was more than 1 percentage point higher than that in January-May; enterprises making losses had a comparative increase of 11%, total loss amount rose 41% comparatively, which was however 13 percentage points lower than the January-May figure.

Under the excellent circumstances of medical and health system reform, medical insurance covering more people, and the government’s commitment in expanding the medical and health domain, enterprises with chemical pharmaceutical products as their main production realized the profit of 18.5 billion Yuan in the earlier 8 months, comparatively increased 17.6%, which was 1 percentage point higher than the  increase rate of January-May period; the number of enterprises with losses dropped by 11.8%, but the loss amount of those enterprises continued to rise with a comparative increase of 13%; export of chemical pharmaceutical products remained sluggish, its export amount of 6.76 billion Yuan in January-August was a comparative drop of 11%, and an increase of 0.5 percentage point in the decrease rate of January-May period.

Accomplished major economic indicators of pharmaceutical manufacturing and chemical pharmacy in January-August 2009