Krishan Jindal

Research Scientist and Agronomist

Regional Experts Workshop on Development, Regulation and Use of Bio-pesticides in East Africa,

Nairobi, Kenya, 22–23 May 2014

Global trends in the development and use of bio-pesticides

“Bio-pesticides are gaining increasing acceptance from growers, and big agro-chemical companies worldwide as a fundamental part of crop protection/IPM looking into their benefits and business opportunities”

What are bio-pesticides? Why use bio-pesticides?Developments and use of bio-pesticides?Bio-pesticides use as seed treatments? What are challenges for their future growth?

What are Bio-pesticides?

Bio-pesticides are certain types of pesticides derived from natural materials such as animals, plants, bacteria, and certain minerals - EPA

1. Microbial pesticides– Consist of micro-organism (Fungi, bacteria, viruses and protozoa) as active ingredient.

2. Biochemical pesticides – Plant extracts, pheromones, soaps and fatty acids, natural plant growth regulators (PGR). Avermectin, Pyrethrins, Spinocid from natural products but not bio-pesticides.

3. Natural enemies – Parasitoids, predators and pathogens of pests.

4. Plant incorporated protectants – pesticide substances produced by plants containing added genetic material.

Why bio-pesticides …..

Tightening regulations on pesticide residues, especially in developed world (Europe and North America).

Non availability of several active substances for crop protection due to banning of many insecticides including neonicotinoid in Europe and cosmetic insecticides in Canada.

Growing awareness among consumers for organic product and chemical free crops.

Growing acceptance of bio-pesticides as an efficient crop protection alternative with eco-friendly foot prints.

Bio-pesticides fits where few chemicals exist e.g. Nematode control.

Why bio-pesticides ….

Fit with IPM systems and contribute to environmentally responsible systems.

Bio-pesticides help with resistance management. 

Help growers to manage residue level creating more opportunities for export to markets where residue limits been reduced.

Most bio-pesticides short pre-harvest intervals, which allow more flexibility in harvest and shipping schedules.

Conventional technique or methods can be used for application. 

Trends in bio-pesticides development

Bio-pesticides are not new they are in use since ages but grower/ industry acceptance happened in last 7 – 8 years.

Global bio-pesticide market was $ 1.3 billion in 2011, and 63 % of it was microbial basis active ingredients.

Projected to grow to 3.2 billion by 2017 @ a CGAR 15.8 %.

North America dominates bio-pesticides market with share of 40 %.

Asia pacific and Europe are expected to be fastest growing market in near future due to stringent regulations for pesticides and increasing demand for organics.

Overall bio-pesticides represent 2 % of pesticides market.

Growth is hindered by well established crop protection chemical market, variable efficiency of bio-pesticides, less awareness among growers.

Bio-pesticides use

First deployed on speciality high value crops, vegetables and greenhouse crops to manage residue.

Now they are being applied on all type of broad acreage crops (Cereals, Oilseed, Sugar, Fiber, Forage Grains).

To date 400 plus active ingredients have been registered across globe and 1250 plus products based on these active ingredients have been registered.

Products based on various Bacillus thuringensis strains dominate the market.

Other major products are based on Beauveria, Metarhizium, Trichoderma, Bacillus subtilis, B. firmus, Pseudomonas flourescens and entomopathogenic NPV.

Commonly used Bio-insecticides

Origin Product Use for control of Manufacturer

Bacillus thurigiensis sp. Aizawa/ sp. kurstaki

Agree®, XenTari®/ Dipel/Deliver/Javelin

Many insects Valent BioSciences; Certis LLC

Paeciliomyces fumosoroseus

PFR-97/ No fly Aphids and whiteflies Certis LLC/ OMRI

Chromobacterium subtsugae

Grandevo Whiteflies, stink bug and cucumber beetle and diamond back moth

Marrone Bio Innovation Inc (MBI)

Neem oil/Azadiractin Trilogy®/Aza-direct Many insects Certis LLC/Gowen

Metarhizium anisopliae

Cockroaches/ drywood termites/ ticks, beetle grubs/

Biopath/ Bioblast/ Met52/Achieve/Real Metarhizium 69/ 78/ 62

Monsanto –Novozyme; realIPM

Beauveria bassiana Naturallis/ Botanigard/Mycotrol

Whitflies/ soft bodied insects/mites/thrips

Troy BioScience/ Laverlam/Bioworks/realIPM

Commonly used bio-nematicidesOrigin Product Control Manufacturer

Paecilomyces lilacinus

MeloCon® Nematode Prophyta; Certis LLC

Myrothecium verrucaria

DiTera® Nematode Valent BioSciences

Bacillus firmus Votivo® Nematode Bayer Crop Science (BCS)

Pasteuria spp.

Econem® Clariva®

Nematode Pasteuria Bioscience; Syngenta

Saponins of Quillaja saponaria

Nema-Q® Nematode Monterey Ag Resources

Trichoderma asperelum

Real T. asperelum Nematode realIPM

Commonly used bio-fungicidesSource Product Disease control ManufacturerBacillus subtilis various strains

Serenade®, Taegro, Subtilex/ Kodiak, Serenade/Rhapsody/Bac Coat

Powdery mildew, blights/wilts/rusts/fire blight

BCS; BASF; Monsanto; realIPM

Streptomyces lydicus

Actinovate®, ActinoGrow®

Soil pathogens Natural Industries; Monsanto

Pseudomonas flourescens

Blight Ban Fire blight Nufarm

Coniothyrium minitans

Contans® Sclerotinia sp. BCS (Prophyta)

Gliocladium virens SoilGard® Soil borne pathogens

Certis LLC

Trichoderma harzianum T-22

RootShield® WP, PlantShield® HC

Soil borne pathogens

Bioworks

Reynoutria sachalinensis

Regalia® Many plant diseases

MBI

Bio-pesticides business

Most of bio-pesticides business was with regional companies till 2009.

In last five years acquisition of many small many companied by big agro-chemical companies happened to increase their portfolio: Bayer crop Sciences – AgraQuest Inc and Prophyta (423 m +); Biagro (Argentina);

Chemtura BASF – Becker Underwood Inc (1 billion) Monsanto – agardis, RNAi provider and Novozyme Bio Ag alliance (300 m) Syngenta – de V gen (523 Million) and Pasteuria Bioscience (123 m)

Other major companies Valent Biosciences Corp (US) – Sumitomo Subsidiary Certis USA LLC (US) Marrone Bio Innovations Inc (US) Hebei Veyong Bio-Chemical Co. Ltd (China) Koppert Biological Systems (The Netherland) Embrapa Milho E Sorgo (Brazil) Ag Biotech Australia Pty Ltd (Australia)

Few bio-pesticides reach market

Less than 0.1 % of the potentially bioactive microbial bio-control agents reaches the market (estimation based on scientific journal, grey literature and theses) Petrot

Today despite of increased research efforts in the last 10 years (especially in India, China, Africa and central and South America), mainly old active ingredients identified 30 years ago and more are in the market.

Most are new strains of same well known species an when they reach market they are less effective than chemical standards (Pam Marrone, CEO of MBI).

What are the reasons ….

Economic limiting factors – high cost for registration 1.2 to 1.5 million Euro in Europe and 1 m in US, and market is small.

More time for registration – EPA and PMRA takes17 months or more. In Europe a product ‘No-Fly’ from Futureco Bioscience took 7 years to get EU registration.

In Asia pacific lack of well defined regulatory procedures, awareness and support for the bio-pesticides.

Bio-pesticides are less effective compared to agrochemicals they are meant to replace them partially.

Response to application is sometimes inconsistent.

Bio-pesticide application requires high technical skills to be successful; and this at grower level is expensive, complicated and needs monitoring (Paul Sopp, Fargo).

What are reasons ….

Most of the technologies tried didn’t fit the context.

Much of the R&D was in public sector at CGAIR and large academic/research institution and they were not tie up with private sector for commercialisation.

Products and technologies have not been customised for the diverse agro-ecologies.

Products which don’t work have been commercially marketed which resulted in lack of interest among growers and Ag sector about bio-pesticides which have not been well regulated.

Lack of regulatory policies, awareness and support for the bio-pesticides; no economic incentive and financing systems.

There is overall weakness in infrastructure for manufacturing and quality control.

What is required to improve success rate?

Address the weaknesses discussed in previous slides.

Develop innovative partnership between private sector and academia for catalytic change.

Require well defined different regulatory policies for bio-pesticides

Govt Support to develop infrastructure for manufacturing and quality checking

Must understand the strengths and weaknesses of the products before taking them to market.

Inform and educate the growers about the reality of the product.

Overall one need to be realistic and honest about bio-pesticides

Seed treatments

Use less product on seeds and therefore less expensive than foliar and soil applications and reduced environmental footprint and fits well in IPM approaches.

The much reported incidents linking the use of seed-applied systemic neonicotinoid with bee mortality has changed that and now there is huge regulatory scrutiny of these uses.

Use of neonicotinoid has been banned temporally banned in Europe, and situation is closely monitored in USA and Canada.

Dust level released from the seeds are checked in the EU and the use of effective polymers is becoming widespread in EU and North America.

Bio-pesticides seed treatment

Big agrochemicals companies looking for new technologies as they are facing more and more problems with synthetic chemistry, plus new chemistry is more difficult to discover, and they will be able afford the cost of registering bio-pesticides.

Bio-pesticides meets the requirement of modern seed treatment technology; safe to use, low impact on the environment, easy to apply, good compatibility, good adhesion, must be safe to operator and end user, must be effective and noval.

Some progress & successful commercialisation of single strain microbial seed treatments has been achieved by both major and smaller companies in North America and EU.

Global seed treatment business

$ 2.3 billion estimate 2012.

Projected to grow to 4.2 billion by 2017 @ a CGAR 10.6 %.

51 % are insecticides, 35 % are fungicides.

North America dominates seed treatment market with 45 % share.

Asia pacific share is just 7 % expected to grow to 306 million (2018)

Europe market will be 663 million in 2018Source: Marketsandmarket report, 2013

$ 4.7 billion estimate 2012 out of it 1 billion is seed inoculants and biological control

Source - AgriThorty

Bio-pesticides seed treatment – VAULT HP Plus

VAULT® HP PLUS – INTEGRAL BIOSTAKED TREATMENT FOR SOYBEAN

Robust Rhizobial Inoculant minimum guaranteed count of 10 billion CFU per ml.

Bradyrhizobium japonicum highly effective and infective strain.

Powerful INTEGRAL Bio-fungicide Extends

suppression of yield-robbing Rhizoctonia and Fusarium fungal diseases.

Complements other systemic fungicides to help promote better root structure and vigor. More vigorous roots mean improved nutrient uptake for added yield potential.

Bio-pesticides as seed treatments - 1. Poncho/VOTiVO - Bacillus firmus -1582 lives

and grows with young roots, create a living barrier that prevents important nematode reaching roots.

2. Kodiak® HB - B. subtilis (6 x 109 CFU/ ml) for suppressing soil borne fungal diseases .

3. SERENADE® B. subtilis with fungicidal activity against soil borne diseases impact seed germination and plant growth in soybeans, cotton, corn, wheat and vegetables.

4. Sonata® – B. pumilus (QST 2808) effective against  downy and powdery mildews and rusts, and is an excellent fit in resistance management programs.

Challenges for future growth of bio-pesticides

IP rights of active ingredients, formulations, treating technologies.

Regulatory requirements of testing and supply of replicated efficacy data from third parties.

Most of time not been able to extrapolate from laboratory to consistent commercially viable field

performance.

Farmers are still skeptical of the ability of the bio-pesticide.

Proper monitoring of crops is necessary to proper timing of bio-pesticides.

Bio-pesticides often target specific pest, meaning other application may be necessary to kill other pests.

Storage of bio-pesticides and shelf life.

To avoid failures formulation quality of biological, and also production scale-up on an economical basis required to be discussed

Whatever may be the challenges and issues, further R&D on bio-pesticides must be given high priority and agriculturists in general and policy makers in particular must be educated about the dangers of handling and application of chemical pesticides, and importance of sustainable agriculture to feed ever growing population”

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