Rotam registers Tuken herbicide in Argentina

The National Health and Food Quality Service of Argentina (Senasa) has approved the registration of Tuken, a new tool developed by Rotam to control weeds in pre-planting and pre-emergence of soybeans. 

 

It has been formulated based on diflufenican with WG formulation, which ensures the product is not retained in the stubble while the penetration of the active ingredient in the soil is maximum.

 

Tuken acts directly on the biosynthesis of carotenoid pigments. Herbicides with this mode of action do not show weed resistance in Argentina. Tuken is not just one more tool to control the Amaranthus on soybean, but it also allows the rotation of products contributing sustainability to the system.

 

For some years, the technical staff of Rotam has been evaluating Tuken on the soybean crop to offer an effective tool for the management of hard-to-control weeds. In addition to this, it brings in an action mechanism totally different to the pre-emergent massively used on this crop, positioning itself as an interesting tool to reduce the pressure of weed selection. The quickness with which resistant biotypes appear in the productive systems depends on numerous factors, and one of the most important is the constant use of herbicides with the same mode of action.

 

Besides the physical properties that allows the product to remain for more than 50 days in five centimeters of soil, where it finds the largest proportion of weed seed banks, the use of Tuken in combination with s-Metolachlor on pre-planting/pre-emergence of soybean crops offers an excellent tool for a wide spectrum control of weeds and a very high residual, allowing the crop to grow free of weeds during the first stages of growth. 

 

Currently, numerous biotypes of resistant weeds across various types of herbicides have been detected, many of them in Argentina. In case of Amaranthus, it is one of the most important problems in the agricultural systems. In South America, the resistance of Amaranthus quitensis to PPO inhibitors in Bolivia and Amaranthus retroflexus in Brazil was confirmed, where it has shown multiple resistance to ALS and Photosystem II inhibitors.

 

In such a situation, the rotation of herbicides is vital through different modes of action to avoid the appearance of resistant weeds, as well as to take care of the available tools, and ensure they are useful over time.