Crop Protection

The New Ag Economy: Why This Downturn is a Structural Shift, Not Just a Cycle

Mon, 13 Apr 2026 21:22:20 GMT

What You Need to Know:

Structural Evolution: This downturn is a permanent market shift, not just a temporary cycle.
Friend-Shoring: Trade is moving toward geopolitical allies to ensure supply chain resilience.
Aggressive Cost-Cutting: Farmers are doubling generic input use and delaying machinery purchases to protect margins.
Financial Resilience: Better management and working capital make today far more stable than the 1980s.
Premium Protein Demand: GLP-1 medications are driving consumers toward smaller, higher-quality meat portions

As the industry enters the third year of this downturn, farmers and agribusinesses are questioning if a recovery is on the two-year horizon. While cyclical behavior is normal, two economists suggest the structural evolution within crop protection, machinery, technology, livestock and other individual sectors is creating a different kind of staying power for those who survive the recovery.

The Evolution of the Cycle

When characterizing the current economic cycle in agriculture, historical patterns provide a necessary baseline, yet the present landscape is defined by unique pressures. Typical agricultural cycles consist of roughly six years of expansion followed by four years of decline. Currently, the market is navigating a “corrective period,” returning to long-run averages.

The drivers of growth are typically demand shocks — export surges, fuel demand or policy shifts such as the Renewable Fuel Standard. However, Wes Davis, ag economist at Meridian Ag Advisors, notes the current environment is an intersection of traditional contraction and sector-specific evolution.

“What I think we’re experiencing right now is that typical cycle behavior where we see growth in some business firms, and then some contraction and pullback to adjust to the cycle going back to more of the long-run average,” Davis explains. “I think we’re also seeing evolution of individual sectors within the market where there’s adjustments happening because of the industry itself.”

In other words, this isn’t just a cycle — it’s also a structural shift.

Change Fatigue and Modern Volatility

Farmers aren’t strangers to volatility, but global trade disruptions, policy shifts and rising competition, especially from Brazil, are layering uncertainty onto already volatile markets.
Farmers are grappling with “change fatigue,” a byproduct of the high velocity of information and extreme price swings that dwarf the relative stability of the early 2000s.

“When I go talk to any industry group right now, the phrase that I hear is ‘change fatigue’, and I feel that. Every couple minutes, something shifts,” says Trey Malone, Purdue University ag econ professor. “But to be clear, it’s not that the farm economy isn’t used to volatility, it’s just the uncertainty and the volatility now is, like, ‘hold my beer relative’ to the old volatility.”

Malone attributes this to layers of uncertainty created by global trade and policy. The rise of Brazilian production, coinciding with the disruption of U.S.-China trade relations, has created a permanent state of flux. This sentiment is reflected in the Purdue Ag Economy Barometer, which shares a higher correlation with the Small Business Index (.5) than with actual commodity prices. This suggests farmers view themselves primarily as small business owners facing broad economic pressures rather than just price-takers.

“We don’t see very strong correlations even with lagged soybean prices and corn prices,” Malone notes. “The world is more complicated than just looking at what happened in the market yesterday and gauging how farmers feel.”

Global Competitiveness and the Trade Reallocation

A primary concern for U.S. producers is their position as low-cost providers. While the U.S. maintains an infrastructure advantage that lowers the cost of getting products to export ports, Brazil continues to close the gap.

“It’s a fair question farmers ask a lot: Are we actually the ones who are the low-cost producers, and do we still have a place in the global market if Brazil continues to lower the cost of production and transport their grain to export terminals?” Davis asks.

However, Davis points out that global trade hasn’t shut off; it has reallocated. Only three global regions — North America, Latin America and parts of Southeastern Europe/Central Asia — are net exporters. The rest of the world remains net importers.

“While our trade has kind of shifted around ... that shift has really reallocated stuff in different places. Those calories and products end up going somewhere. It’s just a question of where,” he says.

The Shift to “Friend-Shoring” and Resilient Supply Chains

The industry is moving from “just-in-time” (hyper-lean) procurement to “just-in-case” (inventory-heavy) strategies, a lesson reinforced by the pandemic. This shift is accompanied by “friend-shoring,” where the U.S. prioritizes trade with geopolitical allies.

“We’ve gone from offshoring to onshoring to nearshoring to friendshoring,” Malone explains. “We’ve got a paper that’ll be coming out ... where we document friend-shoring in ag and food supply chains. Over the last 10 years, there’s been a shift where we mostly in the U.S. trade with other people who vote like us in the WTO. That’s kind of one way to measure friends.”

This resilience is also visible in crop protection. In 2019, 80% of active ingredients were sourced from China. Today, that is closer to 60%, with manufacturing shifting to India and domestic sites. Davis calls these “geopolitically resilient” supply chains.

The Rise of Generics and Decision Paralysis

The economic downturn is fundamentally changing the business model for input providers. Farmers are aggressively cutting costs, leading to a massive surge in generic usage.

“The latest survey I saw shows about 60% of farmers use generics today. That was about 30% to 40% just 5 years ago,” Davis says. This forces companies to pivot from differentiation to operational volume.

In the machinery sector, high costs and economic uncertainty have led to “decision paralysis.” Farmers are extending the life of their equipment, treating machinery replacement as the most controllable variable in managing annual ROI. Davis notes the U.S. ag equipment cycle is currently 15 to 20 percentage points lower than typical low points, driven by this hesitation. Furthermore, there is significant skepticism toward subscription-based technology models.

“Farmers don’t terribly love this idea, and I think the other interesting thought here is I’m not sure that retailers like selling them either,” Malone adds.

AI: The “Undergraduate Intern”

While artificial intelligence (AI) is a major talking point, its current role in agriculture is more supportive than transformative. Malone views AI as a “highly capable undergraduate intern” — useful for processing information but incapable of replacing the trust and risk management provided by human advisors.

“I don’t think you need to be replacing your agronomist. I think your mediocre agronomist just got OK,” Malone says, noting while LLMs can pass CCA exams, they cannot manage the risk of a wrong decision. “The risk management value proposition of an in-person Claude, or whoever, is probably going to win out because there’s still a risk.”

Currently, the adoption gap is wide: While 75% of agribusiness managers see potential in AI, only 4% have implemented it, according to a Purdue University survey in 2025.

Livestock and the GLP-1 Impact

The livestock sector is facing a unique demand shift driven by weight-loss medications (GLP-1s). This is leading to “premiumization.” As consumers eat smaller portions, they are opting for higher-quality cuts.

“The explosion in demand for protein is just shocking,” Malone says. “What GLP-1s do to that calorie count is they are all shifting toward premium cuts. You don’t care how much it costs because you’re only going to have seven bites of it. But you’re going to have a steak. That premiumization is going to really, really take off in the next 10 years.”

Conversely, the hype surrounding “fake meat” has largely faded, proving to be more of an investor-led phenomenon than a market-driven one.

Financial Stability: Not the 1980s

Despite the downturn, the financial health of the American farmer remains more stable than during the crisis of the 1980s. Currently, 10% to 12% of farmers are in a “tight” financial position , compared to 20% to 30% in the 80s.

“We do have a completely different, more professional ag workforce than we did back then,” Malone says. “The farm policy we have right now does not necessarily match what we need for the future, but all of these things make me think we’re in a much more stable position.”

Farmers have built-in “shock absorbers,” Davis adds, including off-farm income and working capital built up during the expansion years. However, in his research Davis has seen how alternative financing is becoming a major tool for the 50% of farmers who use it — either to manage stress or, for larger operations, to leverage relationships with retailers.

Strategic Reassessment: Winning at the Bottom

The experts agree the “bottom of the cycle” is the time for professionalization and upskilling. Surviving — and thriving — will require sharper management. It is an opportunity to reassess farm transitions and management disciplines, such as financial management, accounting and planning, which become critical in tight margins.

“Farmers are going to have to get smarter and get more creative with how they manage,” Malone says. “This is a good opportunity to take a step back and think about what the strategy needs to be moving forward.”

Davis emphasizes relationships are solidified during these periods: “Farmers are going to remember the folks who were around when they were in the bottom of the cycle, and who were there to support them. The best farmers will continue to get better ... I get excited about what we can look like as we come out of this cycle.”

So Is This Ag Cycle Different?

These experts say yes as every cycle presents its own unique reshaping of future opportunities.

To download the full report on why this ag cycle is different and what it means for your operation, click here .

New EPA-registered “Defense Activator” Targets Nematode Pressure

Tue, 03 Mar 2026 19:29:50 GMT

With EPA approval in hand, PI AgSciences introduces PHC68949, peptide-based novel approach to control plant-parasitic nematodes. Designed with short chains of amino acids, it’s technically a biological crop protection product, but its scientists say it provides next-level nematode suppression.

“It is a defense activator that helps the plant defend against plant-parasitic nematodes. Where a nematicide has activity on the nematode, this product gets the plant ready to defend itself and activates the pathways in the plant–thickening cell walls and roots,” says Wes Hays, North America commercial lead at PI AgSciences.

A biological that handles like a synthetic

Hays says this is an extra tool in the farmer’s toolbox with its new mode of action.

“It’s totally different than most products farmers use today. And its performance is extremely compelling. It’s very similar to most synthetic chemistries in the market for nematodes today–providing the consistency, shelf life and compatibility of a synthetic, but it’s a natural product.”

Approved for use on row crops and specialty crops, Hays says the use rate is low—1 to 2 ounces per acre, subject to state registrations and final product labels.

“There’s flexibility with application—in row crops, you can use it as a seed treatment or a foliar. For example, you can put this into your first post herbicide pass. And for specialties, it’s almost predominantly a foliar application, which opens up flexibility beyond drip irrigation or drench applications.”

Where and when to find this new product

With EPA approval, PI AgSciences is now working on state level label requirements. Limited quantities of the product will be available for 2026, with full commercial launch coming in 2027.

This is the company’s third active ingredient for the agricultural market. For commercialization of its products, PI AgScience partners with distributors in the industry including Wilbur Ellis, Helena and Brandt.

PI AgSciences is the agricultural division of India-based PI Industries, a global life sciences company that custom manufactures active ingredients and intermediates. And the recent product introductions are one result since the August 2024 acquisition of Plant Health Care, headquartered in St. Louis, Missouri.

How Syngenta’s New Insecticide Active Ingredient Will Benefit Specialty Crop Growers

Mon, 15 Dec 2025 13:12:45 GMT

The EPA recently approved the registration of Syngenta’s newest active ingredient, Plinazolin, which it has introduced into five new insecticides, three labeled for vegetables, tree fruit and onions.

The products released are part of a new mode of action in IRAC Group 30, which is a new class of chemistries for specialty crops.

The new products for specialty crops include:

Vertento
Incipio
Zivalgo

“This is a product that we have been waiting on for a number of years,” Chris Clemens, agronomy services manager at Syngenta, says of Vertento.

The company says it has spent the past 12 years in research and development and conducted more than 3,000 trials in the U.S. on Plinazolin. The global agricultural science and technology company says growers will be able to deploy the specific insecticides that use Plinazolin in 2026.

New Solution for Onion Growers

Labeled for onions, Vertento is a foliar-applied insecticide for thrips and mites.

“Thrips are a rasping, sucking pest, where they walk up and down the leaf and they scrape on the leaf, and it interferes with the production of chlorophyll, and overall, leads to lower yields,” Clemens says.

He says Vertento offers growers a new mode of action in IRAC Group 30. He says Syngenta has trialed the product in New York, Michigan, Georga, Idaho, Oregon and Washington and has seen excellent performance.

Clemens says this is a much-needed introduction for onion growers who have limited tools against thrips, as there could be potential resistance against existing products on the market. He says another important point is that Vertento shows no cross-resistance to older compounds, as it is a new mode of action.

“Having a new mode of action for a pest that requires anywhere from three to six or more applications is critically important to the industry so that we can preserve the life of those previous insecticides that have been around that we want to keep them effective,” he says.

Shown are untreated broccoli with diamondback moth damage and treated broccoli with two applications of Incipio.

(Image courtesy of Syngenta)

New Solution for Vegetables

Brassica, leafy, fruiting vegetable and cucurbit growers have a new tool in Incipio. Clemens says brassica growers will see a big benefit to deploying Incipio against diamondback moth.

“Diamondback moth has become a particularly difficult insect to control in brassicas, and it’s a similar situation that we have with Vertento and thrips and onions in that we don’t have as many tools as we used to have,” he says. “The new IRAC group 30 mode of action and its inherent efficacy against diamondback moth is going to make it an excellent new tool.”

Clemens says Syngenta has trialed Incipio in Arizona and California and has seen excellent results.

“We have done a lot of trial work in Arizona and California, where the length of control and the overall performance within Incipio is improved versus some of the old standards that include the IRAC group 28 and pyrethroids and other insecticides out there. … We’ve got confirmed resistance in California and Arizona, and growers have unfortunately seen much less efficacy with any of the products that contain chlorantraniliprole,” he says.

Clemens says along with federal registration, several states have also registered Incipio. He says along with diamondback moth, Incipio also offers effective control of western flower thrips.

Shown are potatoes untreated showing Colorado potato beetle damage compared to a crop treated with Zivalgo.

(Image courtesy of Syngenta)

New Solution for Fruit, Potato Growers

Syngenta has tested its Zivalgo foliar insecticide for many years with university and private contractors in the Pacific Northwest, Clemens says. In pome fruit, Zivalgo has shown good control for many pests.

“We’ve seen excellent performance against coddling moth, oblique banded leafroller, which is another lepidopteran pest that comes early in the year,” he says. “Excellent efficacy on mites, including European red mite and two spotted spider mites, and then also thrips as well, and all of those are pests and apples in pears, where we have an industry that relies heavily on insecticide applications for managing pear psyllid and we’ve seen excellent control there as well.”

Zivalgo is also labeled for citrus for control against thrips.

“Zivalgo has performed really well on thrips and citrus and trials in California over the last several years, very much, like with Vertento, we’re down to a limited number of efficacious insecticides that still remain,” Clemens says. “Over the last two years, working in the San Joaquin Valley, the best performer by far has been Zivalgo, at the high rate there, against the other competitors that are out there.”

And Zivalgo is also labeled for broad-spectrum control of Colorado potato beetles.

“The performance and activity that we’ve seen with Zivalgo on Colorado potato beetle is just outstanding,” he says. “We’ve tested it for several years against a number of different competitors under extraordinarily high pressure, and the clear winner in potato foliage protection has been with Zivalgo each of the last two years. So, excellent control there, even under extreme pressure.”

AgZen, Corteva Team up on AI-Powered, Retrofit Sprayer Tech

Fri, 24 Oct 2025 16:10:42 GMT

AgZen announces an agreement with Corteva to further “explore the commercial potential” of AgZen’s AI-powered crop spraying optimization technology, RealCoverage.

The news comes on the heels of Corteva’s big announcement on Oct. 1 , detailing the crop protection multinational’s plan to split its crop protection and seeds businesses.

AgZen, a tech startup spun out of MIT, is making a name for itself by pioneering feedback optimization for spray applications — a new approach the company thinks has potential to improve farmer outcomes and reduce crop input costs.

(AgZen)

AgZen’s first product, RealCoverage, is a retrofit kit that can be bolted onto any sprayer to measure and optimize the number of drops of agrochemicals applied to crops. The system features a boom-mounted sensor that analyzes the coverage and quality of spray applications in real-time, displaying actionable data to a tablet mounted in the cab. Farmers can use the data to optimize the physical settings on spray rigs, both self-propelled and pull-behind, to increase coverage.

The startup says its system works by leveraging AI and cutting-edge computer vision, and customers have used RealCoverage to save 30% to 50% on input costs.

Farmer Feedback

(AgZen)

Northwest Indiana farmer Bryan Brost slapped a RealCoverage system onto his Hagie STS 16 high-clearance sprayer to use on his waxy corn and soybean crops. He says it has helped boost his spray program efficiency overall by reducing application rates while maintaining optimal coverage throughout his 12,000-acre operation.

“The payback came in the first year,” he tells Farm Journal via text message. “We have increased our acres [covered] per day with less hours on the machine, the operator and the nurse tanks supplying product [to the sprayer].”

Corey McIntosh set the technology loose across his 4,000 acre spread in Missouri Valley, Iowa. He is looking forward to using the data to improve his application efficiency across the board. He’s also letting his neighbors and local retailer in on the secret.

“I was getting a chem shuttle refilled at [the] co-op, these guys have always been complimentary of our weed control, I asked them: ‘What percentage of leaf surface area do you think you are covering with your sprayers?’ One of their best operators said he thought 50% coverage. The salesman next to him said it would definitely be more than 60%,” McIntosh says.

“They were shocked when I told them we were at 9% to 10%, but nobody has had ever had a way to quantify this before,” he adds. “We are really looking forward to making improvements.”

Since launching on the market in 2024, AgZen says it covered more than 970,000 commercial acres of application across the U.S. on row crops and specialty crops.

Your Next Read: Breakthrough Fungicide Delivers White Mold Disease Control in Key Crops

Corteva's Bold Move: What Splitting Crop Protection and Seed Businesses Means for the Future

Wed, 01 Oct 2025 18:27:19 GMT

Global agriculture technology company Corteva announced plans on Wednesday to separate into two independent, publicly traded entities: “new” Corteva, which will continue to sell crop protection products – herbicides, fungicides, insecticides and biologicals – and SpinCo, which will focus on the seed genetics business.

SpinCo will include Pioneer, the company’s legacy seed brand established in 1926, as well as Brevant and regional seed brands, including Dairyland Seed.

Upon separation of the companies, Greg Page, current Corteva chairman, will lead new Corteva, while Chuck Magro, current Corteva CEO, will become CEO of SpinCo.

In announcing the decision by Corteva, Magro said the farmer-centric organization appreciates that its customers want and need choice across their input decisions.

“The best way, maybe I can even say, the only way for this company to preserve and expand that choice and keep putting innovative, effective, sustainable solutions into the hands of farmers around the world is to give both businesses the freedom to operate without having to look out for the other,” said Magro, during an online presentation primarily focused on company investors.

He added that the separation of the company into two entities will allow both businesses to maximize long-term value for farmers, customers, employees and shareholders.

Magro described SpinCo – with expected net sales of $9.9 billion in 2025 (56% of current Corteva sales) – as “a classic growth compounder” that will pursue opportunities in out-licensing, hybrid wheat, biofuels and gene editing.

“The continued success of our SpinCo business will be predicated upon sustained investment in advanced genetics and further capitalizing on our unique route to market,” Magro said.

As a pure-play crop genetics company, Magro predicts SpinCo could go beyond its corn and soybean core into other row crops, even expanding into other areas like fruits and vegetables.

“Spinco will also look to expand on new opportunities in wheat, cotton, rice and other products, where genetics can play a transformative role,” he said. “In other words, we could see SpinCo playing in a vastly expanded addressable market.”

Corteva Crop Protection Business Is Future-Focused

For new Corteva, Magro characterized the crop protection industry as competitive and tough, but that company leaders anticipate the market will return to growth in the near future.

“At new Corteva, success will be built upon an optimized supply chain, a new level of operational excellence and the ability to invest in the next generation of sustainable, differentiated innovation, including biologicals and other nature-based products,” he said.

Magro said as company leaders weighed the pros and cons of separating the two companies, they made the decision with the future in mind.

“This is not about today, and it’s not certainly about the last six years. This is about what we see coming,” he said. “We’re in a market that we need to look out 10-years plus. That’s just the research and development and the timeline it takes to bring technology into the marketplace. So this is a long-term decision that we are making.”

Corteva’s 2025 net sales for its crop protection business are estimated to be $7.8 billion (44% of the current company’s total).

During Magro’s remarks, he gave no indication of where the two companies will be based. Corteva’s global headquarters is currently based in Indianapolis, Ind., while Johnston, Iowa, is home to its seed business.

The transaction separating Corteva and SpinCo is expected to be completed in the second half of 2026.

Corteva was formed in 2018 as the agriculture-focused subsidiary of DowDuPont, following the merger of the two companies. Corteva was spun-off as its own entity in 2019.

Your next read: Fertilizer Decisions: Balance Costs, Yields and Sustainability

MAHA Policy Announcement Delayed, Agriculture Waits For Any Implications From Earlier Report

Mon, 11 Aug 2025 21:40:07 GMT

In late May, farmers and the agricultural industry were bracing for the release of the Make America Healthy Again report, which was to focus on children’s health and chronic diseases. Then came the 68-page report, which was responded to by farmers and  more than 300 agriculture organizations  sharing their concerns. Per the President’s executive order establishing the timeline for the MAHA report, policy recommendations were to be given to the president by Aug. 12.

Today, the White House said to not expect MAHA policy recommendations to be announced tomorrow. The Commission will deliver its recommendations by the deadline, per the executive order, however, per White House spokesman Kush Desai schedules of the President and cabinet members need to be coordinated for the public announcement.

Particularly in focus for the agricultural groups in their response to the MAHA movement has been any references to three crop protection active ingredients: glyphosate, atrazine and chloripyrifos. These three were included in the MAHA report as a list of products that can contribute to chronic disease in children.

In its response to the MAHA report, National Corn Growers Association said its findings show that if the three pesticides were to disappear completely, crop yields could decrease by more than 70% due to pests, weeds and disease.

Politico reported on unnamed sources saying the White House has been meeting with stakeholder groups leading up to the policy announcements.

Artificial Intelligence Joins The Fight Against Weeds, Insects And Disease

Fri, 08 Aug 2025 13:53:42 GMT

The crop protection industry needs a reboot, according to Tony Klemm.

As CEO of Enko, a crop-protection startup, he says the company is taking a different approach to solving one of agriculture’s biggest problems – developing safe, effective and sustainable crop protection products that can be brought to the marketplace faster and more economically.

Traditional discovery pipelines for herbicides, fungicides, insecticides are not keeping pace with real challenges farmers face, such as resistance issues, he told Chip Flory, host of AgriTalk on Thursday.

A 2024 study funded by Crop Life International reports the costs associated with bringing a new active ingredient to major U.S. and European markets now top $300 million. In addition, the survey says the average lead time between the first synthesis of a new crop protection molecule and its subsequent commercial introduction is now over 12 years.

Part of the long development time required is related to regulatory hurdles. “There’s just increasing demand for meeting environmental safety needs, rightfully so,” Klemm says.

A Paradigm Shift
Enko, based in Mystic, Conn., is using artificial intelligence (AI) and a machine learning discovery platform to guide the company’s research and development efforts. Klemm describes the strategy as a paradigm shift from the current industry practices for how small molecule crop protection discovery has been done.

“We use DNA-encoded libraries, and these libraries allow our scientists to explore this massive, diverse chemical space in a very targeted, automated and expansive way,” he says.

The technology allows Enko scientists to look at billions of molecules and screen them for safety and efficacy and, in the process, develop them faster and more economically.

“We still have to take the regulatory journey that, right now, no one’s figured out a way to expedite,” he notes. “But getting to that regulatory queue faster and better on the front side is really what’s bringing us that cost savings, that efficacy and is going to allow for more products to be put into the regulatory queue in a faster manner.”

Progress To Date
So far, Klemm says Enko has delivered about 50 active programs that cover all facets of weeds, insects and disease. Many use novel or new modes of action that Klemm believes will help farmers fight resistance issues, such as herbicide resistance in Palmer amaranth and pigweed.

“We’re really working on how we can bring new modes of action to farmers, give them fresh tools to win that fight. And our chemistries work using fewer active ingredients, from perspective of the load on the acre, so we’re designing safer chemistry for the future,” he says.

Specifically, Klemm says Enko recently announced a new grass herbicide is in the pipeline for the European cereals market for control of black grass. The company also has conducted field trials for corn and soybean products in the U.S. that he anticipates are five to 10 years away from market launch, depending on how long they take to move through regulatory channels.

Your next read: Bayer Affirms Support of Glyphosate, Optimistic for a Future with Over the Top Dicamba Labels

Bayer Partners with French Company to Expand Pheromone Distribution

Wed, 23 Jul 2025 19:27:23 GMT

Bayer says it recently signed a development and distribution agreement with M2i Group, a French company that specializes in pheromone-based solutions for crop protection. The new distribution agreement will target Latin America, the U.S. and Asia-Pacific to distribute pheromone gels.

Monte Sorensen, product manager with Bayer CropScience, says M2i’s technology fits in line with trends in Europe toward more biological usage due to regulatory pressure. He says he sees the Press technology and its future use in the U.S. as another tool in a grower’s toolbox and more integrated solutions with the entire Bayer portfolio of products.

“We want to be able to provide a solution to the grower,” he says. “We think that best fit is by being able to talk to them about a solution from pheromone and mating disruption, all the way to your conventional chemistry to cover a big portion of the life cycle of pests.”

Bayer says this new distribution builds on a successful collaboration with M2i as the exclusive distributor of select M2i products in Europe and some African countries. M2i products in have targeted lepidoptera and some sucking pests in crops that include stone and pome fruits, tomatoes and grapes.

Bayer says it has also integrated M2i’s pheromone products into a system of digitally enabled solutions such as pest monitoring tools, which help advise growers on pest pressures and application timelines as well as other products tailored to grower needs.

M2i’s Press technology delivers pheromones through a thick, long-lasting device. Growers apply the gel using a pressurized device directly to the plant.

“The bottle is reusable, and the direct dispensation keeps growers from having to use plastic in an applicator or hanger,” says Phillippe Guerret, CEO of M2i. “This unique innovation is a way to save time and to keep plastic use to a minimum and to reduce waste.”

Sorensen says it will be a couple of years before U.S. growers will see any new pheromone solutions released as part of this partnership.

“We’re really trying to be mindful and thinking through how we can really provide an effective solution for the growers that both works and is right,” he says.

He also sees more grower and consumer interest in biological products, especially as more next-generation biological products come online. But, he says, at the end of the day, growers really just want cost-effective products that work.

“I think there’s opportunities to meet the grower where they are well,” he says. “Hitting on what they want to do — produce, sell and export their product. As we see more regulatory pressure, I see the market probably moving more in that direction [of biologicals], but I still think that there’s a big useful market for the synthetics and conventionals in there as well.”

New Chassis For Application: Terrana Biosciences Emerges From Stealth Mode

Tue, 01 Jul 2025 10:40:00 GMT

The saying in real estate is location, location, location. And that applies for technology being unveiling by Terrana Biosciences.

Emerging from stealth mode after four years of development, this Flagship Pioneering company is taking the RNA expertise of cousin company Moderna, and creating crop protection solutions in parallel but distinctly different than cousin company Indigo Ag.

“Terrana is coming out of the Flagship Pioneering ecosystem in Boston, and Flagship has a long history of working on RNA,” Ryan Rapp Terrana Biosciences co-founder and CEO. “Probably the best known RNA company is Moderna, but we have a whole host of other ones within the ecosystem, and it’s helped allow us to have all this knowledge about RNA, but apply it to solve problems in agriculture.”

Rapp says RNA is a natural solution to deliver proteins and RNA molecules that can solve many agronomic issues.

“Plants have natural RNAs inside of them that have been evolving with plants for thousands of years. They’ve been largely ignored, because when people are thinking about RNA in plants, they’re usually trying to find things that are making plants sick,” he says. “What Terrana does is we actually look at all the things that everyone else has not had the time to look at and we begin working with those and what we’ve developed from that is a class of three products: prevent, protect and improve.”

Still in pre-commercial phase, Terrana is working on its portfolio of biological RNA-based products that can work like a chassis to carry and deliver protein building information directly to the plant. Protective effects provided by such technologies include anti-insect, nematicidal, antibacterial, and one key solution Terrana is focused on is antivirals.
“We’re looking at some of the vegetable species where today there are severe problems with viruses in the in glass houses and protected culture, particularly like tomatoes,” Rapp says. “We’re working to create viral products that can deliver resistance to several different viruses that when you get them, you kind of have to destroy the whole crop in the greenhouse.”

(Terrana Biosciences)

While the company’s first development focus is specialty crops, Rapp is eyeing opportunities in row crops as well.

“Think about Asian soybean rust in Brazil. You’ve got farmers that are growing three crops of soybean a year down there and spraying up to 16 times. We believe with the way that our technology works we could potentially reduce that to one spray per cropping cycle. So it’s basically three sprays per year,” he says.

New solutions to previously uncontrolled pests, improved application efficicacy and climate resilience are all benefits Rapp says are possible.

He points to cherry orchards in the Pacific Northwest requiring chill hours–hours below 45 degrees Fahrenheit. And farmers have observed warmer winters, which leads to poor flowering, poor fruit set and poor quality fruit.

“Farmers don’t have good options today—they could cut down the cherry trees, move north to Canada, or replace trees with new genetics,” he says. “Terrana’s product lets us do something completely different. We could go in during the summer, spray those trees with our RNA based product, and actually attenuate or turn down the amount of cold hours that they need so that they can go back to being productive farms that are setting high quality fruit. This keeps those flavor profiles, keeps the cherries that consumers have come to love, and gives the economics back to the farmer.”

Terrana is aiming to have commercially available products in the next few years, pending regulatory approval, that can be applied as sprayables or seed treatments. And the company says its RNA-based biologicals can be stored at ambient temperature and will be formulated as stand alone applications or for tank mixes.

3 Questions Every Farmer Should Ask About Biological Products

Fri, 27 Jun 2025 13:53:31 GMT

Pam Marrone, co-founder of Invasive Species Corporation, and previous founder of two additional biological businesses, shared her key takeaways with certified crop advisers during a recent webinar hosted by the Science Societies.

Marrone says there are three areas to evaluate before farmers make an application of a biological product:

Specific use instructions
Science
Data

Specific Use Instructions
“First, read the label,” she says. “When do I use it? What’s the timing? Is there any effect on soil? Can I tank mix it? Can I mix it with fertilizer? Can I mix with other pesticides? Some of the labels I’ve seen can be very specific, and others give you almost no information. So, that’s important. Read the label.”

In reviewing label information, identify if the product is registered with the EPA (which requires a higher level of requirements) or non-registered. Also, the specificity provided on the label is an indicator about the overall product quality and performance.

“There are products that are bugs in the jug, and they have a consortium of microbes in the jug or bag. If the product has 500 or 800, it should be proven why all those specifies are necessary, and if quality control is being done on all 500 species,” Marrone says.

Marrone has been working toward one national certification of products to eliminate any issues with heavy metals or human pathogens being included in formulations.

“Quality control measures need to be robust,” she says.

Science
Marrone says in order to draw a line between “snake oil” and reputable products, the manufacturer and the retailer should be able to explain the science behind the product.

“It’s no longer good enough to just say ‘we have the best microbes,’” she says.

For best placement and performance, Marrone emphasizes the importance of understanding how the biological works.

Data
Marrone encourages farmers to seek out significant proof of field data.

“Small plots don’t always work with biologicals,” she says. “And when you are looking at field data, know where the trials were conducted and what the consistency was.”

Marrone believes today’s biological industry has progressed to a new performance threshold.

“These days, you really want to see a win rate of at least 80%. So, 80% of the time you’re seeing a yield increase of at least 7% —anything below that is just noise,” she says. “I know companies today getting consistent 10% yield increases. That’s where the bar has been raised to.”

Breaking Down EPA's New Action Plan for Insecticides

Wed, 30 Apr 2025 17:59:59 GMT

In the trio of Endangered Species Act (ESA) enforcement regulations — herbicide, insecticide and fungicide — the industry now has two of the three to consider.

The final herbicide rule was released in 2024, and just yesterday EPA released its final insecticide rule. This comes after the draft insecticide rule was first released in July 2024, and the final rule takes into account the public comments provided during the comment period.

These EPA regulations are a response by the agency to enforce ESA at the agency level rather than through litigation and the court system.

As new insecticides are registered and existing products are re-registered via the FIFRA process, they will need to comply to the new rule. Unlike the herbicide final strategy already being applied to the label for BASF’s Liberty Ultra, the industry does not have a product to look to as it applies to the insecticide rule, yet.

“Late yesterday, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) released its final Endangered Species Act (ESA) Insecticide Strategy. The Agricultural Retailers Association (ARA) plans to thoroughly review the proposal and provide feedback to the EPA’s Office of Pesticide Programs (OPP), addressing any questions or concerns that may arise,” says Richard Gupton, senior vide president of public policy and counsel for the Agricultural Retailers Association. “At first glance, it appears that the agency is considering the input from impacted agricultural stakeholders, which is encouraging. We will gain a clearer understanding once new labels are registered, and we can observe whether commercial applicators and farmers are afforded the necessary flexibility to utilize these products without facing undue regulatory burdens or additional operating costs.”

3 Steps Behind the Rule

Step 1

Establishes the potential for population-level impacts to the listed species as not likely, low, medium, or high. The low, medium, and high categories indicate a potential concern for population-level impacts that may need mitigation

Step 2

Identifies levels of mitigations that reduce spray drift and runoff/erosion to non-target habitats (e.g., low impacts would be addressed with fewer mitigations than medium or high potential impacts). EPA developed menus that identify mitigations that the Agency has determined to be effective at reducing spray drift and runoff/erosion in different parts of the country.

Step 3

Applies the mitigations by geography, crop type, etc. In those cases, EPA would specify the mitigations on the general pesticide product label. In other cases, mitigations may only apply in geographically specific areas (referred to as Pesticide Use Limitation Areas or PULAs). For geographically specific mitigations, the pesticide labeling would include a direction for the user to access EPA’s Bulletins Live! Two (BLT) website to determine whether they are in an area that requires mitigation.

Mitigation Efforts

Similar to the herbicide rule, retailers and farmers can expect to calculate necessary mitigation efforts including spray drift and runoff/erosion considerations.

Per the Final Insecticide Strategy, farmers and retailers can expect EPA is working to:

develop a process to qualify individual conservation programs that could achieve 9 mitigation points
reconsider using descriptions of protected areas or habitat, as opposed to (or to supplement) the descriptions of managed areas (e.g., what is not a protected area) in the Final Insecticide Strategy.
Develop refined Pesticide Use Limitation Area (PULA) maps2 to limit the spatial extent of off-target mitigations to specific areas to protect listed species and to minimize impacts to applicators
continue to work with stakeholders to evaluate drift-reducing adjuvants as a mitigation measure for insecticides.
work with stakeholders to identify additional mitigation options including potential offset opportunities for insecticides and other types of pesticides.
develop a mobile-friendly application tool for growers and other applicators that provides efficiencies in compiling the label information and helps pesticide users consider their options and understand how their current practices, location, and field properties relate to any required mitigations.

8 Things to Know About the FTC Suing Syngenta and Corteva

Mon, 10 Oct 2022 19:41:59 GMT

On September 29, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) along with 10 state attorneys general filed a federal law suit against Syngenta and Corteva. Here’s what to know.

1. The claim centers on “loyalty programs” with distributors.

These programs specifically paid distributors to limit business with Syngenta and Corteva’s competing manufacturers. These programs are also being labeled “pay-to-block” schemes.

2. The harm caused by the alleged schemes kept prices artificially high.

This is focused on generic insecticides/nematicides, herbicides and fungicides after the companies’ patents on active ingredients (AIs) expired. The FTC estimates the cost to farmers was 20% on those products totaling hundreds of millions of dollars each year because the manufacturers held “monopoly and market power.”

3. The consolidated status of the industry elevated this issue.

In the U.S., sales through the traditional distribution channel account for approximately 90%+ of crop-protection product sales. Seven distributors account for 90%+ of sales through the traditional channel or approximately 80% or more of all sales of crop-protection products in the U.S.

Lina M. Khan, Chair of the Federal Trade Commission, wrote: “Distributors don’t want to miss the payments, so they go along with the program. After all, it doesn’t hurt them to spend more on brand-name pesticides, because they get to pass those costs on to retailers and, ultimately, to farmers. With distributors under-stocking generics, farmers end up having little choice but to buy Syngenta and Corteva.”

4. The companies say their pricing structures and practices were within the law.

Syngenta spokesman Saswato Das said the arrangements were customer discounts that were “part of a voluntary and industry-standard program that has been in place for decades” in the industry. “Syngenta strongly disagrees with the FTC’s complaint, which it believes is contrary to the facts and the law and is without merit,” Das said. “We are disappointed that the FTC has failed to appreciate the beneficial effects that these rebate programs provide to our channel partners and to growers.”

Corteva spokesperson Kris Allen said the company believes the complaint has no basis. “We will vigorously defend our position that Corteva’s customer marketing programs are fully com-pliant with the antitrust laws,” Allen said.

5. The 10 states that joined the suit are: California, Colorado, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Minnesota, Nebraska, Oregon, Texas and Wisconsin.

6. The three AIs from Syngenta this claim centers on are: Azoxystrobin, Mesotrione, Metolachlor

7. The three AIs from Corteva this claim centers on are: Rimsulfuron, Oxamyl and Acetochlor.

8. Possible outcomes include the end of such loyalty programs and restitution granted to farmers.

You can read the public version of the complaint here.

Land O’Lakes SUSTAIN Launches Tech Tool for Water Resource Conservation

Fri, 13 Nov 2020 05:09:12 GMT

The Minnesota Board of Water and Soil Resources today announced the approval of Ag BufferBuilder, a precision conservation planning tool from Land O’Lakes SUSTAIN, the sustainability business unit of Land O’Lakes, Inc., as an alternative practice option under the Minnesota law that requires a 50-foot buffer around all fields that drain to public waters.

The precision conservation planning tool developed by Agren, Inc. and Land O’Lakes, Inc., allows a conservation planner to custom-design crop field buffers to trap sediment and nutrients as water flows off a field. The Ag BufferBuilder tool uses site-specific soil information, 40 years of daily climate data and precise topography mapped by lasers to model the flow of water and sediment from a crop field. This technology identifies where there will and will not be a concentrated flow of water so farmers can strategically place buffers where they are needed. Farmers can install a variable-width buffer that achieves the same—or better—water quality protection using significantly less acreage than a 50-foot buffer.

“Land O’Lakes SUSTAIN is excited to partner with the state to provide flexibility for farmers, while helping to enhance water quality at the same time,” says Matt Carstens, executive vice president for Land O’Lakes SUSTAIN. “The Ag BufferBuilder tool helps enable farmers to utilize technology to the advantage of both their business and their local natural resources. By creating variable width buffers through the BufferBuilder tool, a farmer can preserve land in production and focus buffers in the areas that need them most.”

Carstens continues, “As a farmer-owned cooperative, Land O’Lakes focuses on working with policymakers and farmers to find solutions that meet sustainability objectives and work for the agriculture community.”

The Ag BufferBuilder tool is the latest offering in the Land O’Lakes SUSTAIN suite of tools to help farmers install best-in-class sustainability practices, customized to each operation’s unique landscape and needs. The goal of SUSTAIN is to provide each farmer with comprehensive management tools and conservation practices that help them optimize their agricultural production while also protecting our air, soil and water resources. Land O’Lakes’ extensive data and imaging technology is designed to help farmers pinpoint specific solutions for his or her farm, ranging from improved soil management practices to precision application of fertilizers. To learn more about SUSTAIN, visit sustain.ag .

The Ag BufferBuilder tool will be available through authorized Land O’Lakes SUSTAIN ag retailers who will deliver the conservation planning tool as a service to their growers. Ag retailers outside the Land O’Lakes cooperative network can license the tool with a fee.

Corteva Showcases New Robotic Technology In The Field

Wed, 28 Jul 2021 17:36:35 GMT

Meet “Annie.” This robot being used by Corteva Agriscience is the result of a partnership with Boston Dynamics and Trimble.

The robot is one of Boston Dynamics’ Spot series, which can “walk” between the rows of crops in a field. Corteva is using the robot in field testing of new seed–with all of its data collection capabilities, the robot can be a tool in phenotyping. And the company aims to use it in research and development of new crop protection molecules. Trimble systems power the autonomous navigation.

“Annie’s proximal sensing capabilities and ability to execute specific actions at a certain plot or by individual plant will help us challenge assumptions about the way things are done,” Geoff Graham, leader of seed product development for Corteva Agriscience said in a company news release. “The ability to leverage an autonomous robot to navigate row crop fields, while carrying and pulling instruments to collect data or apply chemicals more efficiently, has tremendous potential as we push the boundaries of what we can deliver to farmers.”

The company’s name for Annie (short for Anatoly) was inspired by Pioneer founder Henry A Wallace’s Anatolian Shepherd dogs.

We're taking ag robotics to new heights collaborating with @BostonDynamics and @TrimbleCorpNews, the jointly developed solution combines the mobility of Annie, autonomous navigation capabilities & an innovative approach to helping farmers overcome ag’s most pressing challenges. pic.twitter.com/ptoRknkq8k
— Corteva Agriscience (@corteva) July 20, 2021