Research & Development at Corteva Agriscience™

At Corteva Agriscience™, we have a tradition of delivering ground-breaking new products that raise the bar on efficacy, efficiency and sustainability because innovation is an important part of a leading company. A significant component of innovation is Research and Development (R&D), where active ingredients are discovered and developed into products that meet customer needs and expectations.

Discovery phase

During the discovery phase, an idea gets improved through iteration to a candidate active ingredient. The journey to market can take 10 years and Corteva Agriscience must understand the industry evolving needs in that time frame. We then create a series of product concepts and targets that are used to focus our discovery efforts.

Discovery is a multidisciplinary effort. Chemists and biologists work together to create and test new ideas. They coordinate closely with the discovery operations group, who ensures a supply of quality materials for the screening process. In addition to generating larger samples of test materials for field evaluation, process chemists identify cost effective and safe ways to prepare the active ingredients using methods that can be scaled up to production levels.

Integrated field scientists play a key role in stringently testing candidate active ingredients under field conditions in target markets and geographies. Regulatory affairs and stewardship then begin the task of ensuring that active ingredients being developed are safe for customers and the environment.

Finally, formulation scientists address the challenge of taking a raw technical material and turning it into a formulated product that is stable, versatile and allows maximum expression of activity under field conditions. Commercial is engaged at each step to ensure that what we are developing will ultimately meet customer expectations.

Development phase

During the development phase, rigorous work needs to be done to prepare our candidate active ingredient for successful product launch.

Integrated Field Scientists (IFS) have the critical task of validating Corteva Agriscience’s actives and formulations under real life conditions. The goal is to fully understand field performance conditions and ensure there are no surprises for our customers. IFS make sure that every formulation works as expected. These tests are critical to product success. Technical education within IFS plays a unique role. They develop and deliver product and agronomic instructional tools to train customers facing employees and support product launches.

To ensure product success, it is crucial that we obtain timely regulatory approvals. The regulatory submission process is very complex. Teams across Regulatory Affairs and Stewardship (RAS) partner to understand the regulatory requirements and determine what studies are necessary to support each submission. We robustly characterize active ingredients and formulations to assess human and environmental risks. This information is then used to create the documents that are submitted for approval. A critical element in the IFS program is the work with RAS to carry out registration trials. They are a key part of the data package that is required to secure the right to sell our products.

A single registration submission may contain data from over 350 separate studies and cost over $100 million dollars. This investment is part of Corteva Agriscience’s commitment to ensure the safety of our products for customers and the environment.

More to come in the Corteva Agriscience pipeline

We have seen how an active ingredient develops from an idea in the mind of a discovery scientist to a major product addressing critical challenges. We take pride in being your trusted partner and providing vegetation management professionals with the products and tools to get the job done right and ensure that practices are sustainable for the long term. We have more on the way in the Corteva Agriscience pipeline — including a new active ingredient that will provide excellent broad spectrum weed control, with a favourable environmental profile.

For more information on our innovations and IVM solutions, please visit IVM.Corteva.ca.

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