A fungicide that could have killed sales of oats and barley to the United States is being relabelled to avoid creating a potential trade barrier.
Bayer CropScience has decided to remove oats and barley from the Canadian label of its yet-to-be released fungicide Stratego 250E.
That will bring it in line with regulations in the U.S., where its use is limited to wheat.
Canadian grain merchants and U.S. importers of oats and barley were worried that trade of those commodities between the two countries could be disrupted if traces of the chemical turned up in an export shipment of finished food products.
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Bayer officials initially said they couldn’t change the label on such short notice and would begin selling Stratego in Canada for use on wheat, oats and barley.
But last week the company said the Canadian Pest Management Regulatory Agency had agreed to remove oats and barley from the product’s label.
Bill Buckner, president of Bayer, said the change will eliminate any possible trade irritant arising from the use of Stratego.
“The issue here is one of not interfering with trade and has nothing to do with the safety and quality of Canadian agriculture products,” he said.
The company is in the process of getting approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for use on oats and barley. When that happens those crops will be added to the label in both countries.
Exporters and importers welcomed news that the issue had been resolved.
“We knew that this would be a concern for some of our customers, so we’re quite pleased that Bayer acted in such a responsible and timely manner on this issue,” said Canadian Wheat Board spokesperson Louise Waldman.
The board sells an average of 550,000 tonnes a year of malting barley to the U.S.
The North American Millers’ Ass-ociation, or NAMA, praised Bayer, saying any disruption to cross-border movement of oats could have had serious consequences.
“U.S. oat millers and Canadian oat farmers need each other,” said NAMA president Betsy Faga, noting that more than 95 percent of Canadian oat exports go to the U.S.
She said residues of Stratego on oats or oat products would likely have presented no health risk, but it was important to assure consumers.
Stratego, which is not yet on the market, is designed to control leaf diseases such as septoria leaf blotch, tan spot, powdery mildew and rusts.
Bayer spokesperson Derrick Rozdeba said while the product is aimed mainly at the wheat market, the removal of oats and barley from the Canadian label will likely mean less revenue for the company this year.
The disparity in the Canadian and American labels arises from the fact that Stratego was registered first in the U.S. Since oats and barley are minor crops there, Bayer’s submissions to the U.S. regulator did not include those crops.
In Canada, oats and barley were included in Bayer’s submissions to the PMRA and the product was approved for use on all three crops.
