Endangered Species Act, Two Years In
In August 2024, EPA released its requirements for herbicides to conform to the obligations spelled out in the Endangered Species Act (ESA). These proposals affected numerous aspects of the herbicide application industry, impacting participants across the value chain. This included ag retailers, custom applicators, growers, and the crop protection product manufacturers.
2026 ESA Technical Guide to Mitigation Options
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Now, almost two years after their introduction, industry insiders say the ESA requirements remain top of mind for a large segment of the agricultural marketplace.
“ESA continues to play a significant role in herbicide regulation, particularly as ESA implements new mitigation requirements through its Herbicide Strategy,” says Dr. Cody Gray, Regional Research and Development Head, North America at UPL.
Throughout 2025, several crop protection companies worked on ESA-compliant herbicides. The first to market was BASF’s Liberty ULTRA brand, which made its market debut last spring.
Containing the active ingredient glufosinate-P-ammonium (also referred to as L-glufosinate ammonium), Liberty ULTRA is a post-knockdown solution that can control both broadleaves and grasses. It is available for use on glufosinate-enabled row crops such as soybean, cotton, corn, and canola.
“We are very proud to say that Liberty ULTRA was the first product to follow ESA guidelines on the label,” says Scott Kay, Vice President, U.S. Crops at BASF. “We’ve learned a lot from having this product and are prepared to work through all the requirements from ESA moving forward.”
Kay adds that from his perspective, adopting the ESA requirements into the industry’s application methods hasn’t been that disruptive a process.
“I think the ESA rules as they came out were much more workable than some of us thought they might be,” he says. “Saying that, I think agriculture already had a lot of good practices built into its existing systems.”
The numbers bear this out. According to the 2025 CropLife/Council of Producers and Distributors of Agrotechnology Pesticide Regulations and DRAs Survey, 68% of respondents described the challenges they’ve faced over the years when it comes to drift as “rarely or never occurring.”
The Implementation Equation
Moving into the 2026 growing season, crop protection producers aren’t expecting many surprises when it comes to implementing ESA requirements into custom application.
“The implementation of the workplan and monitoring processes for individual herbicide label updates is certainly a key priority for our regulatory team,” says Jeff Smith, Associate Director of Government and Stakeholder Relations at Valent U.S.A. “We believe in a proactive approach to understanding and compliance and work closely with the team at CropLife America to provide educational resources for growers, ag retailers, and others across agriculture.”
UPL is also planning to provide more education for customers in conjunction with ESA during the 2026 growing season.
“To prepare for these evolving requirements, UPL is actively training our sales teams and customers on the new label language introduced under the Herbicide Strategy,” says Gray. “Many growers are already implementing several of these practices — such as using windbreaks to reduce drift, establishing riparian buffer zones to limit runoff, or adjusting application rates — so the transition has been relatively smooth.”
Luckily, no one in the crop protection business is expecting 2026 to contain any ESA curveballs when it comes to application practices. Kevin Gesse, Head of Herbicide Product Marketing at Syngenta Crop Protection, suggests ag retailers and their grower-customers follow common sense approaches to application this spring.
“Products such as 2,4-D and glufosinate have already gone through their ESA evaluations,” says Gesse. “Others — such as atrazine and glyphosate — are still moving through the biological review process. Growers should continue to follow label instructions and consult with their local Farm Service Agency or Extension offices for the latest guidance.”
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