I have been meeting and talking with corn farmers for nearly 10 years in my profession as an agronomist, and I find it amazing to see how ordinary, corn farmers react to some of the latest technologies in corn production. When farmers thought that 3- or 4-tonner corn variety was good enough, they were surprised that hybrid technology could easily double that yield. Nowadays, we hear Gawad Saka awardees for corn hitting or even surpassing the 10 MT/ha level. What’s more, farmers are now offered more options to buy hybrids that protect themselves from one of the most serious pests of corn like the Asiatic corn borer (ACB). These hybrids give farmers efficiency, convenience, and most importantly, better control of things in the cornfield.
With such developments, solutions for weed problem should not be that far. While there are plenty of management options, almost all are characterized by limited window of application, crop damage (burn), highly manual, and expensive. Some could even be described as simply ineffective. Just as the ACB problem has been pestering our farmers, weeds are perennial headaches.
So, is there something new to combat weeds in your cornfield? Rather, the right question is: What is this new technology in corn that makes weed control so easy and effective?