Botanical Solution Inc. wins award for best new biopesticide

Botanical Solution Inc. has won the Crop Science Award for best new biological product (biopesticide) for its plant-based fungicide Quillibrium.

BSI, a venture-backed corporation based in Davis, California, with subsidiaries in Latin America, provides sustainable and cost-effective advanced botanical materials for agricultural and pharmaceutical applications. Its winning biopesticide is made from quillaja saponaria, an evergreen tree in the family Quillajaceae native to central Chile.

“We have demonstrated that Quillibrium is a great tool for growers looking for highly efficacious integrated pest management strategies against rapidly changing climate and disease pressure conditions,” BSI CEO Gastón Salinas said. “We are fortunate to take part of this incredibly rewarding and exciting journey, to develop essential and truly sustainable tools for supporting key challenges of modern agriculture.

“We are grateful to our partner Syngenta for helping us to augment and accelerate our value proposition to the end-users of Quillibrium.”

The 15th installment of the Crop Science Awards, formerly known as the Agrow Awards, were held online Nov. 10. According to the awards website, award criteria was based on “the product’s effectiveness and how its formulation is acceptable to users and distributors, forging a niche in a market dominated by synthetic chemicals. The judges were not looking for products that perform in the laboratory. We want to see biologicals that work in the real world.”

BSI’s distribution partner for Quillibrium, Syngenta, led the winners with five top awards.

One of the most highly contested awards was for Best Industry Collaboration. BSI and Syngenta were named finalists for this category.

“A few weeks ago, we brought leaders, startups including BSI and those passionate about biologicals, together for our first-ever Biologicals Summit at our R&D site in Stein, Switzerland,” Corey Huck, Syngenta’s head of global biological business, said. “Quillibrium and our partnership with BSI are great examples of how to create the right innovation ecosystem, to bring biological solutions to farmers everywhere, faster.”