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Monsanto meets with weed scientists about dicamba

A Monsanto spokesman says the company’s meeting last week with 35 weed scientists from the U.S. and Canada brought all sides to the table to discuss issues with new dicamba herbicide formulations. Ty Witten, Monsanto’s Crop Protection Lead, tells Brownfield Ag News, “Did we try to seek alignment across the board? Absolutely not. But, we wanted to have collaboration and understanding from both sides and how do we meet in the middle? Because, ultimately, the farmer needs to achieve a benefit on their farm and this technology is going to be important.”

Witten says farmers need the products for weed resistance management and on-target use and a presenter, who had five other university studies in hand, agreed with Monsanto’s assessment, “You know, volatility does occur but it is not the primary culprit for the off-target movement.” Witten says localized recommendations for using the product will continue to be important.

Monsanto declined to name the university scientists who attended the meeting but provided the states they were from: Indiana, Illinois, Nebraska, Florida, Texas, Kentucky, Tennessee, Kansas, North Dakota, South Dakota, Arizona, Iowa, Michigan, Colorado, Mississippi, Alabama, Michigan, Oklahoma, Georgia, Wyoming, North Carolina, and, Ontario Canada. Monsanto says 60 scientists were invited.