Biologicals and Product Stewardship

Biological products are growing fast, but we rarely hear about stewarding them in the marketplace. The market for biologicals is forecast to grow at more than 10% a year, compared with around 2% for conventional crop protection (MarketsandMarkets; AgbioInvestor).

For synthetic pesticides, it’s common, in fact expected, that products are managed responsibly across their life cycle and that product stewardship programs are in place to reduce risks. It’s less common when we talk about biologically based products.

The term biological covers several classes of products, mainly biopesticides, biofertilisers, pheromones and biostimulants. They are made from materials derived from living organisms, naturally occurring substances or compounds that are identical to those found in nature. Their benefit in farming comes through natural biochemical, physical or biological pathways. They are generally seen as less hazardous and face fewer regulatory hurdles.

However, product stewardship is more than managing safety and hazards. It’s fully understanding the risks as a product enters the market and is used by farmers. Each product is different, and whilst there is less emphasis on environmental or human safety, these still warrant consideration.

Beyond that some of the important aspects that are critical for success. These include:

• Efficacy: when and how to apply, under what conditions, and how much to use, and making sure farmers understand this.

• Storage and transport: whether there are any special requirements.

• Packaging disposal.

• Supply factors: how products are categorised in different jurisdictions and integrity of biological claims.

  For example:

• Live microbial products may lose viability if they get too hot during storage.

• Tank mixing biologicals with fungicides may reduce performance.

• Results can vary more with conditions than they do with synthetics.

This matters beyond any single product. When a farmer tries a biological and it doesn't work well, usually because it was stored badly, applied at the wrong time or mixed with something it shouldn't have been, they rarely blame the handling. They blame the whole class of products. A product stewardship program that starts with a robust look at where things can go wrong protects both the individual product and the category's reputation.

Synthetic products have decades of stewardship experience behind them, and we don’t need to start from scratch with biologicals. Much of the approach carries across, even if the risks are different. I'd be interested to hear from others working in this space. Are you seeing stewardship programs built for biologicals, or is it still mostly left to the label?