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Monsanto excited about new dicamba labels

The EPA has made dicamba herbicides for over-the-top use Restricted Use Pesticides for 2018. Scott Partridge, Monsanto’s vice president of global strategy, tells Brownfield the EPA accepted its recommendation for its XtendiMax product, “We’re excited about it because the requirement of training, recordkeeping, and limiting sale to certified applicators and those operating under their supervision directly address some of the off-target movements, the vast majority of the off-target movement we saw last season.”

Partridge tells Brownfield the restrictions will limit the application to avoid drift damage caused by temperature inversions, “What we did was, we have now proposed and the EPA has accepted our label that prohibits applications during night time hours – from sunset to sunrise.”

Brownfield asked Partridge if Monsanto should have sought a restricted use designation in the beginning, “I’m not going to look backwards. You know, we know that training and education is critical. But, let’s take a step forward here. It’s time for industry to come together. Based upon our learnings last year, training and education is just critical.”

The EPA’s announcement applies to Monsanto’s XtendiMax, BASF’s Engenia, and DuPont’s Fexapan herbicides on genetically engineered soybeans and cotton.