Industry Insights: Stepan’s David Allen on the Growing Role of Biological Solutions
27 June 2023 AgriBusiness Global spoke with David Allen, Director Of Business Development – Global Surfactants at Stepan Company, whose mission is to “provide innovative chemical solutions for a cleaner, healthier, more energy efficient world.” Allen discusses ag partnerships and the growing role of biological solutions.
ABG: In 2021, you launched Project Shield with a pair of French academic laboratories. Can you explain the progress made with that partnership in combating rapeseed sclerotinia?
David Allen: Yeah, rapeseed sclerotinia is a disease of economic importance in Europe. We’re in the second year of a three-year project, and we’re making some good progress. In May of 2023, they’re doing some sprays for this project, and we’re excited to review the data in the coming months. It was a unique opportunity because of the Farm to Fork legislation in the European Union (EU).
Stepan has a focus on improving biological products. One of the products that we’re using in the experiments is a fermentation product that we licensed from another company in 2019. It was a really good opportunity, and we are really appreciative of the university partners that we are working with and the French government, which provides the funding.
ABG: Working with academic laboratories is a great way to get research done and cost effective. What have been some of the other benefits?
DA: For this particular project, Stepan provides the formulation, knowledge, and expertise. The universities provide the testing facilities and manpower to do the testing and analysis of trials. We’re doing that all in France and using the local university ecosystem to help with the complexities of doing trials on row crops, especially for rapeseed sclerotinia.
It’s a win-win. We’re getting a lot of funding from the EU to do this, but we’re also deploying our folks in a specific area that we find really interesting and that we have knowledge and expertise. There is more interest in biological formulations and trying to improve efficacy, because biological products often don’t have the robustness of, let’s say, a synthetic product.
We were able to have this opportunity because we have operations in Europe, especially in France. The way the funding works is geared to companies that have a footprint there. We probably wouldn’t have tackled it on our own because the barriers are just too high. For a company like us, it would be very difficult to do this on our own.
ABG: Have you seen an increased interest in growers customizing solutions of combining biologicals with synthetics over the last 10 years?
DA: There’s a strong interest in biologicals either on their own or combined with other products. The other products could be synthetic or semi-synthetic or extracts and essential oils. There is a lot of interest in making biological formulations stable or fit for purpose in the industry. Farming practices have been designed for using synthetic products. The biological products tend to be not as robust in the jug. Most of the work is figuring out those nuances and making formulations that fit into the agronomic practices of today.
The other area of interest is in products that have better efficacy or mixture compatibility with other products in the tank. Companies are also looking for efficacy in label claims and signal words on a label for safety. We’ve seen a lot of companies asking about how to improve signal words or a way to give a lower signal word on a label. There are some active ingredients that can move the needle on the safety word or the label language. We do a lot of work in making the use of the product safer for the applicator.
ABG: What kind of trends are you seeing for United States growers using biopesticides on row crops?
DA: There is a little bit in some parts of the country. We’ve seen some adoption of biological products in row crops, in certain applications. With crop prices being as high as they are, there’s a little bit more room for people to try some of that. Then as certain active ingredients get regulated out, that’s another opportunity to incorporate some of those biological products into those systems. I’d say you’ve probably seen more adoption of biological insecticides than biological fungicides. Another driver is resistance, along with the regulatory landscape, makes it a little bit easier to adopt biologicals for the larger crops. But it’s not common practice yet.
ABG: There’s a lot of talk right now about how synthetic active ingredients are overstocked in the market right now. Do you think cheaper synthetic crop protection will price out the biologicals?
DA: Overstock in the agricultural economy tends to repeat itself. We tend to not learn from the lessons of the past. There are really good reasons for having some of the overstock because of what we came out of in COVID and the supply chain problems that we’ve had as an industry.
The economic realities of growing crops is going to lean toward what the price points look like and how they line up against each other is important for a grower. But I will say, you know, if resistance is a driver or in other applications where safety or toxicity are really important, then using those biological products is going to be the only option.
It’s the same thing with any other product, you have to show return on investment to the grower. If the biological product is doing that, they’re going to use that.
ABG: What are some of the resourcing challenges for biologicals?
DA: There are a couple of challenges for resourcing biologicals. One is trying to find people that understand microbiology and formulations, pairing those two disciplines in a single person is pretty rare. Most of the time, we have to have a team approach with microbiology and formulation technology experts sitting side by side.
A second challenge is all the testing, which is a little bit different than synthetic testing in terms of viability of the organisms. Are they alive or not? In some cases, it’s getting the active ingredient itself. Getting off-patent synthetic active ingredients is pretty straightforward. Biological products, depending on what they are, could be a little bit complicated.
You might have to grow biological active ingredients yourself, which means you have to have fermentation, plus microbiology, plus formulation.
ABG: There sounds like a business opportunity in that. What do you think?
DA: There are a few biologicals that are ubiquitous, right? But there are also many different products in the marketplace today. There’s more opportunity in identifying new strains or new types of different bacteria or fungus. People who are able to find microbes in the environment, understand what crop disease they would eradicate, and then getting it into the hands of folks that can commercialize it.
ABG: Along the lines of sustainability, can you talk about the mission of your company is to help with the environment overall?
DA: Stepan’s sustainability goals are woven into its corporate values. Our corporate values, like continuous improvement and doing the right thing, are aligned with our pillars of people, planet, products, and practices. What we’re trying to do is innovate and bring products to market that are going to improve the planet or how people interact with those products end to end. This challenges our employees to think differently and in an agile manner.
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