Bayer Crop Science (BSC), a company of German multinational pharmaceutical firm Bayer AG, is hoping to sell more of its “revolutionary” herbicide in the Philippines, embarking on new ways to market its products including the nationwide simultaneous virtual field tour it recently launched.
A statement showed that BSC recently launched an innovative nationwide simultaneous virtual field tour, which featured its newly developed pre-emergent herbicide called ‘Council Complete’, a revolutionary herbicide that is highly effective in weed control.
Featured in the Facebook page of BCS, the field tours, called Online Kapehan, brought farmers on a journey to different locations across the country, including Alicia and Angadanan in Isabela; Talavera in Nueva Ecija; Naujan in Oriental Mindoro; Trento in Agusan del Sur; and Tambulig in Zamboanga del Sur.
During the virtual field tours, it was shown that Council Complete is safe to use in rice farms, especially when applied during the early stages of the crop.
BSC said that farmers who cooperated in the field trials of this herbicide brand affirmed the effectiveness of this product in controlling highly-pestering weeds including the known resistant ones.
Emman Serame, a farmer in Nueva Ecija, said Council Complete enabled the growth of rice plants without having to compete in nutrients with weeds and made the rice fields “completely clean.”
Council Complete is recommended to be used on rice plants two to four days after transplanting or at zero to one leaf stage of the plant.
It should be used with the fields irrigated with water at three to five centimeter level in order to best control weeds. Even when flooding occurs, farmers should not worry that the herbicide’s effectiveness will lessen as long water level does not overflow the paddy field.
“Council Complete gives the rice plant the headstart it needs to grow without competition in nutrition with space or with weeds and other plants,” said Allan Velilla, BCS head of its Southeast Asia Agronomic Technological Center in Calauan, Laguna.
“It has gone through long-term studies and its ingredients have been selected from the best compounds. With a new mode of action and better efficacy, the product is safe for rice plants and effective in selecting only targeted weeds,” he added.
The herbicide, according to him, is even suitable for farmers now because they do not have to go back to the fields repeatedly to spray amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
Council Complete is recommended for lowland rice planting and is registered with the Fertilizer and Pesticides Authority (FPA) for rice only