Courtesy: CHAT Newsroom

By Angela Kazmierczak

Matador pulled from Western Canada market; local farmer says approved insecticides not sustainable

Mar 1, 2023 | 5:09 PM

MEDICINE HAT, AB – The Pest Management Regulatory Agency (PMRA) is pulling Matador from the Western Canada market.

Matador is used by farmers to control grasshoppers and flea beetles.

Local farmer, Nicole Neubauer, says that without access to it, it leaves farmers in southeastern Alberta in a vulnerable place.

“So it’s very concerning because as producers we have tools in our tool kit that we can use to manage our operations. There’s incredible challenges within agriculture, and usually when one challenge exists then a few others spawn off as a result of it, ” said Neubauer.

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“Because of our continued drought conditions over the years, the conditions have been conducive to massive populations of grasshoppers explosions. They have the ability to literally decimate a crop,” she said.

Currently, Matador is approved for human consumption, but not for animals.

The farmer says alternative insecticides can be used, but she requires two to three sprays in order to achieve the same results. Whereas, Matador required one spray, making it the most sustainable and carbon conscious.

“It doesn’t make a whole lot of sense to me to be running a sprayer, which is a diesel engine, over top of thousands of acres to get the same control that we already had with the mechanism we were currently using,” she said.

As for costs, Neubauer says that instead of $8, farmers in the region will pay $30 per acre to spray, and this excludes the farmer’s time, diesel, and wear and tear on machinery.

She feels the government needs to have a backup plan before removing products off the market, especially since just last year local cattle producers were facing a barley shortage from a severe drought.

“The solution to barley shortage was to import grains from the U.S for our field lots and to formulate into feed stock.”

She claims farmers will no longer be able to purchase livestock feed from the U.S.

“Because it’s not ban in the U.S., as a livestock producer, we will no longer be able to purchase grains grown in the U.S., so it seems like there’s a lot of information that needs to be understood about where the agency is heading with this regulation because there is certainly some unintended consequences that will result,” said Neubauer.

Christina Stroud, the Head of Corporate Affairs, from Syngenta Canada says they are complying with the PMRA. Syngenta also filed a submission for the product to be restored.