Panelists meeting again on dicamba

Vote on 2018 ban held off last week

A state task force that will help decide the future of dicamba in Arkansas is scheduled to meet again today atop Petit Jean Mountain near Morrilton.

The use of dicamba on soybeans and cotton genetically modified by Monsanto to be tolerant of the herbicide has fractured the farming community — between those who want to plant the new seeds, those who don’t, and other farmers whose specialty crops are susceptible to dicamba.

As of Wednesday, 950 complaints of dicamba damage have been filed with the Plant Board, prompting the state on July 11 to ban sales and use of the herbicide through Nov. 9, a 120-day prohibition.

Faced with that divisiveness, the state Department of Agriculture had the Winthrop Rockefeller Institute of the University of Arkansas mediate the task force’s efforts to help state regulators decide how, or if, dicamba can be used next year. The decision will affect farmers’ decisions this fall on what to plant next spring.

Even that effort — to keep discussions civil, to consider all aspects of the matter — took a hit last week in the task force’s inaugural meeting, when facilitators refused to let the panel vote on a motion to recommend a ban on the herbicide for next year.

Taking a vote should have been allowed, Shawn Peebles of Augusta, a task force member who farms 1,500 acres of certified-organic edamame, sweet potatoes, pumpkins and green beans in White, Prairie and Woodruff counties, said a day after the first meeting.

“I was shocked, especially with the information we had been given,” Peebles, said, re-

ferring to a presentation that afternoon by weed scientists with the University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture. “I am not sure exactly what power that task force actually has, but we had called for a vote, we didn’t feel like we needed any more information. We relied on the UA Extension Service for nonpartisan information, that this is a very unsafe product for Arkansas.”

The weed scientists reported that large-scale testing last month at UA experiment stations showed that new herbicides by BASF and Monsanto were “volatilizing” off plants as a vapor or liquid many hours after applications and moving miles away to susceptible plants. Even soybean plants covered by 5-gallon buckets during application incurred damage as little as 30 minutes — and as much as 36 hours — after the buckets were removed, Jason Norsworthy, one of the weed scientists, told the group.

“This is not just an agriculture issue,” Norsworthy said while showing photographs of damage to sycamore and magnolia trees as well as tomato and vegetable gardens well away from row crops.

DETERMINING FIELD LOSS

There also is a clear difference between physical drift — where a swath of a field shows damage — and volatilization, which damages a field from one end to another and from side to side, Norsworthy said. Hooded sprayers, restricting applications to midday and other regulations won’t fix a product’s volatility, he said.

Yield losses are still difficult to determine and are determined by a number of factors, Norsworthy said. “There are damaged fields that won’t have loss,” he said. “And there are some fields you might as well not put a combine in.”

About a dozen representatives of the herbicide makers, along with Dow and Bayer, attended the task force meeting as special advisers. None had questions for the weed scientists, although Dan Westburg, a BASF representative, said investigations by the company into the cause of any damage aren’t complete. “I will not stand here and say Engenia is not volatile … but it [volatilization] is a minor contribution,” he said.

The new herbicides — BASF’s Engenia, Monsanto’s Xtendimax with VaporGrip, and DuPont’s FeXapan — were touted by the companies as being much less volatile than older formulations of dicamba, a herbicide used around homes and farms for some 50 years. All three companies face lawsuits filed in federal courts in Arkansas and Missouri.

LAST MEETING

With the harvest soon to start, today’s meeting likely will be the last, members said. Any recommendations by the panel will go to the state Plant Board, the governor and lawmakers.

David Wildy, a Manila farmer on the task force, tried twice to have a vote on banning the use of the herbicide after April 15. That would have made all dicamba herbicides, including the new ones, useless for an incrop tool against pigweed and other weeds that have grown resistant to other herbicides.

Wildy said recently that he was disappointed no vote was allowed and believed his motion would have passed.

Janet Harris, director of programs for the Winthrop Rockefeller Institute, declined to let Wildy’s motion proceed. She said the task force’s proceedings weren’t governed by parliamentary procedures followed by other public bodies and that its responsibilities included gathering as much information as possible before issuing its recommendations.

Wes Ward, state agriculture secretary, also told the group it needed to collect more information. “We want as much discussion as possible,” Ward said shortly after Wildy made his motion. Ward added that representatives for Monsanto, BASF and other companies had said they’d get more information to the task force.

Wildy said there is no information forthcoming that will alter a situation in which an estimated 900,000 acres of Arkansas soybeans, and untold acres of vegetables, fruit and ornamentals, have allegedly been damaged by off-target movement of the herbicide.

“The data shows and proves the volatility,” Wildy said. “There is nothing to dispute that. They [Arkansas weed scientists] are getting the very same results in surrounding states. This proves that it’s not a regulatory issue, it’s a volatility issue. Our weed scientists are among the best in the world, and it’s disappointing that the agriculture community isn’t showing them the support they deserve.”

Any information shared today by manufacturers apparently won’t include news of any alterations of the dicamba herbicides.

About an hour before the task force started its meeting Aug. 17, other BASF officials held a conference call with reporters and defended Engenia’s performance this summer — as long as farmers and applicators strictly abided by instructions as put forth by the company and approved by the federal Environmental Protection Agency.

When asked if the company is again studying the product for volatility, Chad Asmus, a technology marketing official, said research and development efforts were concentrated on “next-generation” products.

Asmus said farmers need to make sure sprayers are triple-rinsed and that they use correct nozzles, to make sure droplets of the herbicide are large enough to prevent drift. “It’s important to keep in mind that slight alterations or deviations from the label can result in physical drift going farther than expected and often times that can be confused with volatility,” Asmus said.

Scott Kelly, a BASF vice president, also was asked about any new formulations being developed that would be less volatile. “We continue to look for new innovations and solutions, including dicambas or other technology that will benefit farmers,” Kelly said. “But I wouldn’t say there’s anything to be looking for that would be here in the near future.”