Farmers and weeds are in a constant battle every growing season. Now, the struggle is becoming more costly and less effective as more weeds develop resistance against common herbicides.
To compound the already precarious situation, several bans on chemical herbicides have steadily risen across the globe.
While bioherbicides have been part of the defence against weeds in some instances, they have lagged significantly behind.
So, what’s holding back bioherbicides? Let’s delve into what the industry experts have to say about the weed control innovation.
Reasons for the Lag
Here are the two top reasons industry experts attribute to the lag in the development of bioherbicides for weed control.
1. Cost of Production
The global market is flooded with low-cost herbicides that farmers have trusted for years.
The challenge for startups and established agrochemical companies is scaling up production of bioherbicides. Products that not only offer the efficacy of well-known chemical herbicide brands but also the same budget efficiency to farmers.
2. Finding Effective Bioherbicides
That said, the reason biologicals have been hard to crack, according to Virginia Corless, the CEO of Moa Technology, is finding herbicides that cover all aspects of weed control.
A herbicide needs to control weeds effectively, safely, and at low use rates, covering diverse agronomic conditions.
Relying on substances as produced in nature (like plant extracts and pathogens) to formulate an effective herbicide is problematic. This is especially complicated by the fact that most of them are toxic to humans and animals.
What Does the Future of Bioherbicides Look Like?
Hundreds of substances have been investigated and dozens of patents filed; however, bioherbicides hold only a paltry less than 10% of the market.
But all hope is not lost, as new technologies stemming from bioherbicide research are beginning to shape the industry.
Moa Technology, for instance, has developed a class of “amplifier” molecules that can be used with other synthetic chemical herbicides.
This combination reduces use rates, extends the spectrum of the weeds the herbicide can control, or breaks specific resistant weeds. Corless believes this is one of the innovative ways that the Ag industry can offer viable solutions for farmers.
The Toothpick Project is yet another smart biotech solution that is helping hundreds of farmers in Kenya combat the parasitic weed, Striga.
The team is harnessing a fungal pathogen, Fusarium oxysporum, that occurs naturally in the soil to produce amino acids that kill the weed.
The cultured pathogen is placed on sterile toothpicks which are mixed with cooked rice to create a fresh inoculum that is then planted with the maize seed. The fungal strain, after successful approval, can now be coated on the seeds prior to planting.
Claire Baker, the director of the Toothpick Project, hopes to scale production beyond Kenya’s border to countries like Tanzania and Nigeria, and perhaps the U.S., in the near future.
Baker is acutely aware, as are many biotech startups and established companies, that many farmers are waiting for affordable and sustainable bioherbicide innovations.
Dr. Pam Marrone, a pioneer in ag biologicals and the executive chair of the Invasive Species Corporation, also emphasizes the need to incorporate the latest technologies to accelerate innovation.
“All the new tools we have in machine learning, AI, genome mining, and bioinformatics save huge amounts of time and resources. This is the kind of thing that can be applied to all kinds of new discovery with microbes,” she says.
The new bioherbicide innovations, coupled with old-fashioned techniques like controlling the weeds before they set seed, can offer more sustainable weed control systems.
Lead Editor for Insight Weeds.