Reporter’s notebook: BASF says dicamba’s volatility issues long overblown
Bayer and BASF are defending themselves against charges in a civil lawsuit that they intentionally caused "an ecological disaster" in order to increase their profits on dicamba-related products.
The Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting is one of the few media outlets covering each day of the groundbreaking trial as part of an in-depth project on dicamba, its makers and its impact. Your support makes this possible.
Read:
Day 1: Dicamba on trial: Internal docs show Monsanto, BASF prepared for drift complaints prior to dicamba launch
Day 3: Monsanto executive: ‘We anticipated (drift) might happen’
Day 4: Monsanto officials limited testing on its own plots
Day 5: Monsanto officials testified dicamba may drift, but not enough to harm crops
Day 6: Despite assurances to farmers, BASF told pesticide applicators dicamba may cause soybean damage
Day 7: Peach farmer takes the stand in lawsuit against Bayer, BASF
Here's a look at day seven of the trial, February 4, 2020.
By Johnthan Hettinger/Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting
Farmers have long thought that the weed killer dicamba is volatile, but that history is unfair, according to Tuesday video testimony from BASF officials.
During the testimony, Jeff Birk, regulatory affairs manager for BASF, said that drift has long been a bigger issue than volatility with dicamba but the tradition within the ag community has been to point the finger at volatility.
Because dicamba only affects new growth, signs of the herbicide hurting sensitive crops often aren’t seen until at least a week later. Because of that, farmers mistakenly believe that the damage didn’t happen immediately.
But Birk and Nathan Borgmeyer, who was product launch manager for BASF’s Engenia herbicide, said BASF’s field studies over the years point to application issues being the more likely culprit.
“It happened the day you sprayed it, you just didn’t see it for two weeks,” Borgmeyer said.
This means that Clarity, an older, more volatile version of dicamba, was likely safe enough to use on the soybeans, testified Borgmeyer.
BASF supported initial attempts by Monsanto to commercialize Clarity as a new pesticide, tentatively naming it M1691. Ultimately, Monsanto launched its own new version of dicamba.
Despite this confidence in Clarity, BASF wanted to release Engenia because its patent had expired on Clarity and it made sense to roll out a new product with a new system, Borgmeyer said.
The improved version was marketed as “the most flexible and advanced dicamba.”
Knowing that many farmers fear volatility with dicamba, BASF told its employees to only bring up risk reduction strategies for spraying dicamba after emotion had faded from the conversation, Borgmeyer testified.
Plus, if the emotion was reduced on the front-end of the sales, if and when drift calls came in, BASF representatives would be better able to handle those complaints.
Even with BMP, 2012 drift studies find 5 percent damage
Testifying about a 2012 joint slideshow compiling field drift results from Monsanto and BASF, Birk said that, even when used with best management practices, soybean fields beyond 200 feet from the application site had as much as five percent leaf symptomology.
Birk said he wasn’t sure which company conducted the studies but they learned more about how to spray the pesticide before it was launched in 2017.
“We’ve had additional learnings that would improve upon those best management practices,” Birk said. “The best management practices of 2012 cannot be mistaken for best management practices on the label.”
BASF knew defensive planting would drive sales
Dicamba-tolerant soybean acres increased from 0 in 2015 to more than 60 million in 2019.
In that period, some have speculated one reason for the boost in sales has been farmers planting the seeds defensively, or to protect themselves from drift.
BASF thought that might happen, according to a Tuesday video testimony. A market analysis by Entira supplied to the company prior to the launch of dicamba-tolerant soybeans said that farmers from Ohio to Kansas City were buying dicamba-tolerant seeds because they feared drift.
The analysis included interviews with individual farmers across that region.
In a June 2015 meeting about the new dicamba-tolerant system Engenia and its sales strategy, multiple Missouri-based representatives warned Borgmeyer that about 50 percent of customers were concerned about off-target drift and lost profit, according to his video testimony.
Link between BASF, Monsanto
In a video deposition, Ronald Repage, director of global marketing for herbicides for BASF, went through years of documentation of the relationship between BASF and Monsantoin developing the dicamba-tolerant system.
In that relationship, BASF developed the dicamba and Monsanto developed the seeds.
Linking the two together is a key component of Bader Farms’ case because the lawsuit alleges: "Through their partnership, joint ventures, shared technologies, and mutual greed, Defendants have conspired to create and encourage an ecological disaster in Missouri and other states to increase the profits and demand for their dicamba products," the lawsuit states.
The companies worked together discussing regulatory issues, commercial issues and product development.
Bader Farms’ remaining witnesses
Video testimony is done for the week.
Bader Farms is likely going to take through Friday to present its case, lawyers said, but the rest of the witnesses will be in person, or at least live.
Left on the witness list is: Brett Begemann, chief operating officer of Monsanto; Denise Bader, wife of Bill and co-owner of Bader Farms; Roberto Lopez, crew leader at Bader Farms; Ford Baldwin, a retired professor from the University of Arkansas; and Joseph Guenther, an expert on damages.
I don’t know if they will all testify or not.
Monsanto is scheduled to present its defense after the plaintiffs close their case. BASF is scheduled to present its defense last.
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Reporter's Notebook: Day 1 - Jury pool included those with dicamba complaints
Reporter's Notebook: Day 2 - Monsanto flooded with calls from 'driftees' in 2017
Reporter's Notebook:Day 3 - Monsanto recruited farmer to speak on its behalf at 2016 meeting
Reporter's Notebook:Day 4 - 'We don't threaten customers'
Reporter's Notebook:Day 5 - Most of Monsanto’s 2017 complaints related to drift, not volatility, contractor says
Reporter's Notebook:Day 6- Farmers sprayed illegally near Bader, more on Monsanto testing practices
