Hey readers,

A short one this week because I am packing my suitcase to attend Biocontrol & Biostimulants LATAM in Campinas, Brazil! I am so excited, and you will surely see fresher news and new trends on where the world of biologicals is heading.

But! There is still plenty in this edition. We have a biological control alternative for the desert locust, and yes, it is a fungus. Bayer teams up to make an insect-killer out of a microbe's molecule. On the research side, some bacteria hunt Fusarium down in wheat, and a cabbage endophyte takes on black rot.

Metarhizium acridum is the biocontrol agent FAO currently considers most appropriate against the desert locust, with no harm to bees, birds, or other non-target species. It is a living fungus that infects the locust and grows inside it until the insect dies.

Spores that land on a locust germinate on the cuticle and force their way through the shell by pressure and enzymes, rather than waiting to be eaten. Once inside, the fungus multiplies and competes for the insect's water and nutrients, and the locust weakens over three to four days and dies by the fifth. It then sporulates on the cadaver, which turns the dead insect into a fresh source of infection for the next one that passes (Eléphant Vert).

It is sold as NOVACRID, built on the strain EVCH077, and produced by Eléphant Vert at its fermentation plant in Meknès, Morocco. The company reports efficacy on par with chemical insecticides. It also persists in the field for up to six weeks and works at very low doses, sprayed through conventional or ultra-low-volume equipment.

The reason it matters this season is timing. FAO's May bulletin has the locust breeding across Morocco and into western Algeria and Mauritania just as the region's wheat and barley harvest comes in, with an average swarm of 40 million able to strip 80 metric tons of vegetation in a day (Ecofin Agency, citing FAO, May 2026).

A chemical kills once and washes off. Metarhizium acridum keeps working: it produces new spores on the dead insect that can infect the next one, an advantage against a pest that keeps coming back.

Fusarium crown rot is a quiet, expensive problem in wheat: it sits in the soil, resists most chemistry, and tends to announce itself only as yield already lost. A study published in April screened 81 myxobacteria, soil bacteria that glide in coordinated swarms and hunt other microbes, and put the strongest performers up against the disease (Frontiers in Microbiology, April 10 2026).

Two species stood out: Myxococcus fulvus (strains KT23 and KE15) and Cystobacter fuscus (strain HM-E). In greenhouse trials they controlled the disease by 52.94 to 88.24 percent across single and mixed infections, beating the chemical fungicide tebuconazole. In the field, biocontrol efficacy reached 74.67 percent, and grain yield rose 13.71 to 27.82 percent over untreated, infected plants.

Myxobacteria are barely used in agriculture, in part because they are demanding to grow, but a bacteria that hunts the pathogen in the soil and lifts yield at the same time is exactly the dual action a crown rot control needs, if it can be produced at scale.

Bayer is chasing the molecules that microbes make, rather than the microbes themselves. On June 9, the company signed a research partnership with the Belgian firm Aphea.Bio to co-develop bioinsecticides against sap-sucking insects (Aphea.Bio, June 10 2026). The deal pairs Bayer's development, regulatory, and commercial reach with Aphea.Bio's pipeline of bioactive metabolites, molecules screened from selected microbial strains. The work starts in fruit crops, pome and stone fruit, citrus, and grapes, with room to move into vegetables and row crops such as cotton and soybean.

The partners are not selling a living organism. They are isolating the compound a microbe produces and building it into a product meant to be stored and handled like a conventional insecticide, which Aphea.Bio frames as the benefits of a biological with the shelf life of a non-living product.

They are betting that growers want a biological's benefits without a living product's fragility, and that a stable molecule delivers exactly that.

Black rot is the disease crucifer growers fear most. Caused by Xanthomonas campestris pv. campestris, it can take up to 90 percent of a crop, and control still leans on copper, with the resistance and residue problems that brings.

Screening 65 endophytic bacteria from cabbage, researchers narrowed the field to ten, then to one standout: isolate BR25/2, identified as Pseudomonas synxantha (Life, April 2026). It cut disease severity by 81.12 percent in planta and 33.5 percent in the field, matching copper-based treatment, and raised head weight by 31.8 percent under field conditions. As an endophyte, it works from inside the plant rather than as a surface spray, and it promotes growth on top of holding back the pathogen.

Copper has carried crucifer disease control for more than a century. A living endophyte that matches it in the field, and adds weight to the harvest, is the kind of result that makes the switch look less like a compromise.