CropLife Retail Week: Glyphosate Production Ending?, Brazil Surpasses U.S. in Crop Protection, and March Farmer Sentiment

Eric Sfiligoj and Lara Sowinski discuss the possible ending of glyphosate production by Bayer, global crop protection sales, and farmer sentiment.

Can’t see the video? To view it, please accept cookies by clicking the icon in the bottom-right corner of the screen, or click here.

♦ Subscribe to CropLife Retail Week’s Youtube Channel

*Below is a partial and edited transcript:

Eric Sfiligoj: Hello. Welcome. to another edition of CropLife Retail Week. I’m Eric Sfiligoj, editor of CropLife. Here again with Lara Sowinski. Lara, how are you doing today?

Lara Sowinski: How are you? I’m good.

ES: I see that the, me standing behind you when we’re in the office together and pounding over the head has left a mark. I’m sorry.

LS: No, it was all the time spent outside. Is a child without sunscreen. I don’t even think we knew what that word was back then, so. No.

ES: That’s true. Yeah. Actually. Yeah. You’re. You’re old enough to remember when I was outside, I never worried about getting sunburned. And me, that was. But, yes, I that’s. We all pay for it now with our visits, our regular visits to the dermatology doctors.

Because, yes, we’re we’re all dealing with those. Some of us are at least dealing with that among our viewers, I’m sure. So, yeah. Well, I think thankfully, of all days, it’s like I have to have this thing on. Hey. So, Yeah, well, that’s all right. That’s all right in the room. We pointed it out, so now we can move on to the news of the week.

And actually, we’ve got some very, very big news to share. And again, this kind of under the speculation heading, but still it’s important. So we should talk about it. I know I ran across an article in the Wall Street Journal that appeared, middle of April. It’s talking about, conference call that was had with the CEO of Bayer.

That was we would be Bill Anderson. And basically, Bill implied that the, Bayer, because of all the ongoing lawsuits and other, issues with glyphosate, may stop producing the popular herbicide in the very near future. The direct quote Bill Anderson used is we’re pretty much reaching the end of the road. We’re not talking money or we’re talking months, not years.

So again, this this would be a huge development in the US agricultural marketplace. Lara, I found some statistics that said that U.S growers in 2024 applied about 300 million pounds of glyphosate to their crop fields, and that if Bayer no longer produced it, it wouldn’t go away as a herbicide. But the main producers then would all be based in China and, again, trade issues between the US and China these days are not the not the best.

So this this could be a major development if it actually takes place. Yeah. I heard similar comments from Bill. Politico did a, webinar, I guess, videocast. Recently and he, he said that same thing on no uncertain terms. We’re getting out of that business. So, yeah, it, it would be a major development.

And again, one other thing that Bill pointed out is some of the costs involved. I mean, the company, etc., set aside $16 billion to try to settle some of these lawsuits. Yeah. But they said that basically in some years that the losses from the glyphosate lawsuits are totaling about $3 billion, and that basically the money being brought in by glyphosate is around 2.5 billion.

So again, losing, losing money, it but we will follow this and see what happens. But, you know, we may be we may be nearing the end of, Bayer and glyphosate production. So that could be a very big deal indeed. Yeah. So one of the things Sharon Kraft protection, I ran across this item, I know that, you know, in terms of consumption for crop protection products around the world, the U.S has traditionally been the biggest consumer in terms of each year what they what is, what is produced and what they use in crop fields.

But in 2024, according to Okin Finance, Brazil surpassed the U.S. in sales for the first time. They actually had sales of $14.3 billion for crop protection products going to Brazil. And in the U.S it was only 13.1 billion in 2024. So that was that was rather interesting. I mean, I know Brazil does a lot. They mentioned specifically that their production in soybean, corn, sugarcane and coffee were the main drivers for this growth.

LS: But I didn’t realize that Brazil was was going to surpass the US. But yeah, apparently they did. So yeah. Yeah, yeah. It’s just not surprising. I mean, again, when you look at the commodities, and their production again, as you listed it, they’re just a powerhouse right now. So they are indeed. Yeah. And if you’re wondering, the crop protection companies around the world, the global sales, this report mentioned that Syngenta was still the global leader, $13.6 billion in sales in 2024, followed by Bayer at 12 billion, with BASF at 9 billion and Corteva at a little over $7 billion.

Yeah, actually a little bit on, on that trade thing. But, as you know, I do indeed enjoy the, Purdue CME monthly, Economy Barometer. So this is the March barometer that came out at the beginning of April here. March’s barometer was down 12 points, to a reading of 140, down 12 from, you know, 152 and the prior month, according to, produce summary, farmer’s view of the future was decidedly less optimistic in March than in February.

Follow ups in key crop prices since mid-February, combined with concerns about the future of ag trade and farm policy. Were big drivers, and reasons for this shift in this sentiment. I did want to read a little bit more from produce. Summary of the March survey. Again, kind of to your point about trade and so forth.

U.S. farmers are concerned about the future of U.S. ag exports and trade policy. Since 2019, barometer surveys have included a question that asks producers about their expectations for U.S. ag exports over the next five years. Historically, exports have been an important source of demand for U.S. ag products. Strong exports have often been associated with strong farm incomes.

In 2019 and 2020, producers were optimistic that exports would grow over the upcoming five years. But that optimism up to missing began to erode in 2021 and has continued to fall since that time. So in March, this is this, current survey that we have producers expectations for U.S. exports in the next five years reached an all time low in barometer surveys, was the percentage of producers who expect to see exports fall, which was 30%, nearly matching the percentage of producers should expect to see exports rise.

So, all time low as far as, expectations on U.S. exports of ag products? One last item. Prior to the November 2024 election, farmers in our surveys reported that they were more concerned about interest rate policy than trade policy. Since November, however, concern about trade policy has skyrocketed, with 43% of respondents on average citing it as the most important policy, or program affecting their farm.

So, yeah, just this you know, we’ve talked about it for just a lot of uncertainty. That continues, frankly, around trade policy. And you mentioned, China being the only producer of, glyphosate, going forward potentially, which it looks like it will be. So what does that mean for that? What does that mean for our egg exports?

Yeah, I it’s really an uncertainty. I can’t emphasize that enough. So reflected obviously, in the March survey from Purdue, CME Group. Yeah. I guess the only good news, of course, is I know that a lot of, you know, a lot of stuff’s going into the ground obviously right now. So the export component doesn’t come into play for a couple of months.

Yeah. Yeah. At this point. So fingers crossed. Hopefully that in the next few months there’ll be a little more clarity in the marketplace than there happens to be right now. So I hope so, yeah. On a positive note, yeah, you mentioned I, I do have some travel coming up. Super thrilled to be a moderator for an ESR panel at the upcoming Cfpb, FDA’s adjuvants, inserts and Crop Protection Conference.

The conference is going to be done in Cape Coral, Florida. Dates are May 5 through 7. Check it out. Kfda.com. I’m doing, kind of an update, if you will, a little bit on the EPA’s, essay obligations where we stand right now, as we all know, the final herbicide strategy was released last August, the final insecticide strategy.

We should frankly get any, any day now. We’re looking at by the end of April, which, you know, it’s days, days away. So we should see that. Yeah. Keeping an eye on that. My panel, all star panel here. I don’t mind saying, Leah doozy from Compliance Services International, as well as Dr. Stanley Culpeper from University of Georgia and Bill Chisholm, a retired senior biologist with the EPA.

So, we have, some updates on CPDA’s work with drift reduction adjuvants and how that plays into mitigating runoff has pesticides. So this will be a good panel kind of where are we at today? What’s changed since, you know, we had that November, webinar CropLife where we had educational webinar with folks talking about.

So we’ll kind of, get everyone caught up and see, what’s going on right now. Have some updates with regards to funding for EPA staffing, how industry, can play a part in getting some of the backlog, addressed. So it should be great. And, I know, well, and on a super high note, look at this.

Our CropLife, the ABCs of SCA. This is the special report we did. It won a gold medal at the regional American Society of Business Publication Editors. We won a gold medal. Yay for our Special report. And of course, the reason you’re you’re bringing that up is the meeting. You’re going to kDa.

We’re going to have copies of that report to be handed out to attendees. So yeah. So an extra reason to go to cpd.com and join us down. And beautiful Cape Coral Florida. And a couple weeks. Yes. Oh no I’m sure that’ll be a good meeting. And fingers crossed. Hopefully there’ll be maybe a couple of still images or a video or two.