Over-the-Top Dicamba Ruling Explained

By Stephen Robertson

The Essentials

• On February 6, 2024, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (abbreviated as EPA) was ordered by a federal court to vacate (or nullify) the registrations for dicamba products registered for over-the-top applications on dicamba-tolerant cotton and soybeans.
• The registrations for Engenia, Tavium, and Xtendimax are no longer active.
• The EPA issued an “Existing Stocks Order” to allow for the limited sale and use of these products, restricted to those stocks that were in the sale and distribution pipeline prior to the February 6, 2024 ruling.

Considerations for 2024

For this year only, you are allowed to use your over-the-top dicamba products in a manner consistent with the provided label if you have dicamba-tolerant cotton or soybean. As a precaution, do not use dicamba products off label. Other dicamba formulations have a higher volatility and drift potential and can injure or kill sensitive broad-leaf plants.

On February 6, 2024, a federal district court in Arizona ruled that the EPA failed to meet the legal public disclosure and comment period for reapproving dicamba products labeled for over-the-top applications. As such, the EPA was forced to vacate registrations for dicamba products labeled for over-the-top applications in tolerant cotton and soybean varieties. The affected products are Engenia (BASF), Tavium (Syngenta), and Xtendimax (Bayer).

Given the timeline of the court’s ruling, many growers have already purchased dicamba and dicamba-tolerant soybean seed. To address this issue and to avoid growers using over-the-top applications with more-volatile dicamba products not labeled for use in cotton or soybean, the EPA followed the registration removals with an Existing Stocks Order, which allows for the limited sale and use of existing stocks. For this year only, growers of South Dakota are allowed to use those dicamba products in a manner consistent with the existing labeling. In other words, the EPA has recognized the problems associated with this sudden ruling, and they have made provisions for growers to be able to use those affected dicamba products this year.