The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on [Nov. 9] approved Monsanto Co.’s XtendiMax, a powerful new formulation of the powerful weed killer known as dicamba. Farmers and the company have said the new version is needed to combat pest plants that can choke out soybean and cotton plants, and which can’t be killed by other sprays.
XtendiMax was specifically designed for use with newly engineered soybean and cotton plants, which were also developed by Monsanto. These plants were designed to resist the weed killer, which is the only form of the herbicide allowed to be sprayed over the tops of these plants.
The company had intended to release both products in tandem, but, because the EPA had yet to approve the herbicide, the company had a limited release of about 1 million acres’ worth of the seeds earlier this year.
As company expects planting of the seeds to broaden to 18 million acres in 2017, some fear farmers could be tempted to use older, cheaper versions of dicamba on the plants illegally….
Already in 2016, reports of alleged dicamba damage to crops jumped, agriculture officials and academics said….
The GLP aggregated and excerpted this blog/article to reflect the diversity of news, opinion and analysis. Read full, original post: New Herbicide Arrives Amid Fears of Crop Damage
