According to Kline & Company’s Crop Protection Manufacturers Report, U.S. crop protection sales rose 9.5% over the previous year, totaling $8.0 billion in net manufacturers’ level sales in 2012. Many macro-economic factors, essential for a strong market remained in place, as above-average commodity prices, along with positive global demographic changes, economic growth, and rising standards of living, drove optimism within agricultural markets prior and into 2012.