Syngenta has agreed a strategic collaboration with Japan's Kyoyu Agri Co. Ltd to bring a new rice herbicide based on the active ingredient cyclopyranil to selected markets across Asia. Kyoyu Agri developed the molecule; Syngenta will market products based on it, using its own regulatory expertise, manufacturing and commercial network.
Cyclopyranil is Syngenta's first rice herbicide with the protoporphyrinogen oxidase (PPO) inhibiting mode of action, known as Herbicide Group 14. According to the two companies it controls a broad range of grass and broadleaf weeds, including populations that have become resistant to the widely used ACCase and ALS herbicides, and it can be applied both before and after the weeds emerge.
The deal comes as herbicide resistance spreads in rice. Researchers have documented more than 190 cases of herbicide-resistant weeds in rice worldwide, with barnyard grass among the growing threats to yields. "As herbicide resistance spreads, the effective toolbox of options available to rice farmers is steadily dwindling," said Ioana Tudor, global head of marketing at Syngenta Crop Protection.
For Kyoyu Agri the agreement opens markets that would be hard to reach alone. "Bringing our proprietary technologies to the global stage is a key milestone for us," said its president, Masakazu Yamada.
AgNavigator notes that the partnership comes as Syngenta has been linked with a possible future Hong Kong listing, and that it shows how large crop protection companies increasingly act as commercialisation partners for molecules found by smaller specialists, rather than bearing the full cost and risk of discovery themselves.
For Asian rice growers facing weeds that no longer die under familiar chemistry, a new mode of action is the news; the companies have not said in which countries or when the product will be sold.
Photo: Salicyna / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Source: AgNavigator
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