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ASA leader urges patience in quest for dicamba answers

A farmer leader with the American Soybean Association (ASA) is urging growers to be patient as work is being done to find out how dicamba damage to soybeans has occurred this season. Davie Stephens farms in western Kentucky and is Secretary of the ASA, “It’s all come about in six weeks and to find an answer – you know, the golden egg – for what has happened on such a large scale in such a short period of time is really just really pushing the envelope. It’s kind of unrealistic. Even me as a farmer, it’s kind of unrealistic.”

Stephens tells Brownfield ASA leaders have been in close contact with the makers of the new dicamba technology, “I’m talking about Monsanto, BASF and DuPont Pioneer. We’ve been working with industry leaders to try to figure out what’s going on, through many conference calls.”

Stephens says ASA is also working with state soybean checkoffs and the national checkoff, United Soybean board, on the dicamba issue as they all try to find out what’s going on. While operator error is suspected in some dicamba product application, Stephens says “not all farmers became bad farmers in one year.” He stresses that ASA is not pointing the finger at anyone and is just looking for answers which they hope to have by the end of this year because the weed control technology is needed for the 2018 growing season and beyond.

Audio: Interview with Davie Stephens:

 

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