Issue link: http://read.dmtmag.com/i/769560
www.goodfruit.com Good Fruit Grower JANUARY 15, 2017 29 "It's proven very safe, very effective," Kim said. Meanwhile, Dutch chemical and nutrition company Royal DSM started exploring the use of natamycin on mushrooms and pineapples. Pace began working with DSM, the largest producer of natamycin, to make the compound for fruit. Pace has commercialized the product under the trade name Biospectra 100 SC. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency granted registration in August this year for postharvest use of natamycin on citrus fruit, pome fruits, stone fruits, cherries, avocados, kiwis, mangos and pomegranates. The company also has applied for organic certification and expects to be on the April 2017 National Organics Standards Board discussion agenda. Natamycin has already been registered for use on organic mushrooms in Canada. One hurdle, however, is that natamycin may not be compatible with certain sanitizers required by the new Federal Food Safety Modernization Act, Kim said. Pace is still testing. Pace is a chemical development company that makes a wide array of treatments for the fruit and vegetable industries. The company is a subsidiary of Valent BioSciences Corporation, a Japan-based Sumitomo Chemical Company. Natamycin worked on a variety of fungal diseases for cherries and citrus fruit and never led to resistance in his bioassay tests, Adaskaveg said. He then helped DSM and Pace develop a formulation he thought would work on the market. The product is exempt from the EPA's maximum residue level restrictions. He cautioned that researchers still have a lot of questions about the product. For example, it is effective on a broader spectrum of fungal decays on cherries and citrus than it is on apples and pears, on which tests yielded inconsistent results for managing Penicillium decays. "There's kind of a quagmire of questions that we have," he said. However, he believes the compound will help out the fruit industry in a safe way. "It is a remarkable fungicide, so I don't want to downplay it," he said. • GFG Di l Ad i i Thi d P Bl k X