For healthy potatoes - Bayer CropScience

Confidor ® is the world’s leading agricultural
insecticide, registered in over 120 countries
and more than 140 crops. It is the key product
of the commercially most important class of
insecticides emerging during the last 20 years,
the chloronicotinyls or CNIs (syn. Neonicotinoids).
Confidor controls a wide range of sucking and
biting insects with low application rates and
long-lasting efficacy.
A new oil-based formulation technology,
named OTEQ ® , now makes it even more
effective and more robust to unfavorable
weather conditions. New research shows
that it actually helps plants to better cope
with abiotic stress situations. That makes
Confidor a reliable and all-around player
in the agricultural world of insecticides for
the upcoming years.
Confidor is the world’s best selling
insecticide and number one Bayer Crop-
Science product. Including seed treatment
and environmental science uses, it generated
€587 million in sales in 2005.
Launched in 1992, it became global market
leader five years later, thanks to the
innovative mode of action of its active
ingredient, imidacloprid, its excellent efficacy
and environmental profile and its versatility.
In the seed treatment segment (when
applied to seeds) the product is marketed
under the trademark Gaucho ® .
Flexible application technology
Confidor offers excellent root systemic
efficacy and plant compatibility. The optimum
usage of these properties can be
obtained by application methods which
work via the root system such as drench,
drip irrigation, in-furrow and float systems.
The stem application of Confidor is
commonly used in crops like citrus and
hops. Confidor also offers good residual
efficacy as a foliar spray. By spraying to
leaves or drenching to roots, stems or
trunks Confidor can be used in more than
140 crops and requires fewer applications
than some competitor products.
In 2006 Bayer CropScience launched a
unique new formulation technology making
its active ingredient even more effective
against sucking insects. Confidor
OTEQ ® is a patented formulation, ensuring
improved foliar adhesion, better penetration
and enhanced rainfastness.
And there’s more. Over the years, farmers
worldwide have noticed that plants treated
with Confidor looked healthier. In 2005,
independent research proved that the product
not only controls insects, but also acts
as a Stress Shield.
Biotic and abiotic stress factors
Plant growth and productivity as well as
the product quality are greatly influenced
by environmental stresses to which plants
are continuously exposed. The optimal
growth and development is far from that
realized in the field or greenhouse.
A major proportion of yield losses in
crop plants is due to so-called abiotic stress
factors, which occur as e.g. drought, flooding,
heat, cold, excessive light, high salt
concentration in soil or ozone in air, to
name a few. There is another group of stressors
namely fungi, bacteria, viruses and
herbivores (insects) causing ‘biotic’ stress.
When record yields are compared with
average yields, the impact of the environment
on plant productivity becomes apparent.
If record yields can be assumed to represent
plant growth under ideal conditions,
then the losses associated with biotic and
abiotic stresses can reduce the yield potential
by up to 80%. Most of the losses are
attributed by far to suboptimal growing conditions
in the environment, i.e. abiotic stress.
2/06 COURIER 7