The Agribusiness Association of Iowa supports the availability of dicamba as a critical weed management tool for Iowa agriculture. Below is an excerpt of the letter submitted during the EPA comment period.
Dicamba has been in use since the 1960’s. Since then, it has a proven record for safe, economical, and effective weed control. EPA should continue to maintain the registration of dicamba products based on peer-reviewed science and data that continue to show it is safe when applied according to the label.
EPA strongly encouraged Iowa’s development of the Iowa Pest Resistance Management Program to protect Iowa crops from costly pest resistance. AAI plays an active role in this program, and we need multiple modes of action and timing of applications available to applicators to battle the costly development of pest resistance. Dicamba is an important tool for managing resistance that has developed in some weeds to multiple herbicide modes of action. It is important for applicators to continue to have both pre- and post-emergence dicamba application options as part of their available toolkit to successfully control weeds and pesticide resistance.