Dow Says Spread of Herbicide Tolerant Weeds Accelerate

Dow Chemical Co. (DOW), the biggest U.S. chemical maker by sales, said the spread of weeds resistant to the glyphosate herbicide made by Monsanto Co. (MON) is accelerating, creating opportunites for products it plans to begin introducing this year.

About 65 million acres of U.S. cropland harbored weeds last year that aren’t killed by glyphosate, the world’s best-selling herbicide, Antonio Galindez, president of Dow AgroSciences, said today in a webcast from the Bank of America Merrill Lynch Global Agriculture Conference in Miami. Infested land rose 25 percent in 2011 and 51 percent last year, he said.

Glyophosate is the active ingredient in Roundup, Monsanto’s brand for the weed killer.

Dow expects to earn $1.5 billion selling a its 2,4-D herbicide and crops engineered to tolerate it, Galindez said, repeating earlier forecasts.

Dow should receive U.S. approval to sell a reformulated version of 2,4-D in months, he said. Corn that tolerates 2,4-D should be approved later this year, with soy approval expected in 2015 and cotton in 2016, he said.

To contact the reporter on this story: Jack Kaskey in Houston at jkaskey@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Simon Casey at scasey4@bloomberg.net