“Fruit exporters face the challenge of aligning themselves with several international initiatives like the EU’s Green Deal and the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals. These initiatives emphasize reducing insecticides and promoting environmentally friendly phytosanitary products that protect biodiversity. It’s important for the industry to understand what’s at stake for exporters: If they do not comply with these initiatives, they cannot sell their products.” Natalia Gamarra, Suterra’s business development manager, shares this insight with FreshFruitPortal.com. Based in Oregon, Suterra is grower-owned and part of The Wonderful Company, based in California. 

Suterra’s branded pest control products, including CheckMate and Puffer, work through pheromone mating disruption.

Gamarra explains these are effective because they confuse male pests. “When female insects are sexually mature, they produce a unique chemical signal called a pheromone that allows males to find them and mate, even from long distances away. Suterra’s products perfectly replicate this signal, allowing growers to diffuse the pheromone throughout their orchards, vineyards, or fields. The added pheromone in the air essentially ‘blinds’ males to the location of females in the area. The goal of mating disruption is to reduce mating and lower the overall pest population over time.”

Natalia Gamarra- Business Development Manager Suterra

Beyond this clever benefit, “Suterra products help growers reduce their carbon footprint because they are passive dispensers or aerosol emitters that are typically applied only once per season. This reduction in the spray equipment operations saves on fuel and CO2 emissions.”

She underscores that Suterra is a pioneer in pheromone biocontrol. “We are 100% aligned with the objectives of sustainable use regulations. We have a fundamental role in contributing to their fulfillment because all our solutions are framed in the sustainable control of pests. All the products we offer are environmentally friendly and perfectly applicable to an integrated pest management strategy. The vast majority are also approved for organic production by the U.S. EPA and listed by organic certifiers such as OMRI.”

Gamarra adds that Suterra’s role is offering farmers “new tools that are not only effective but also innovative. In Suterra, we have always harnessed innovation to solve grower problems. We were the first to commercialize pheromone-releasing aerosol diffusers, the patented Puffer®. We were also the first to offer mating disruption for more complex insect pests like vine mealybug and California red scale. We are the perfect allies to help sustainable growers and fruit exporters meet the requirements of EU and UN guidelines.”

New EU rules

Such positioning is important because, as of Oct. 1, the European Union will enter into force the transitional phase of its new regulation - the EU Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) - that will create incentives for non-EU producers to reduce their emissions. 

Gamarra tells FreshFruitPortal.com that this set of proposals review and update existing EU legislation ensuring that EU policies are in line with the EU's climate objectives. This will reduce net greenhouse gas emissions by at least 55% by 2030. 

This will initially apply to imports of certain goods and selected precursors whose production is carbon-intensive and poses the greatest risk of carbon leakage.

In the field

Suterra’s products disrupt pests globally in citrus, pome fruits, stone fruits, tomatoes, grapes, almonds, pistachios, figs, pomegranates, walnuts, broccoli, brussels sprouts, cabbage, cauliflower, watercress, and other vegetables. 

For the 2024 season, Gamarra says the U.S. market catalog includes 26 different mating disruption products. “However, our reach is large with different products available in Europe, Latin America, South America, Africa, and so on. Our company is truly global, so we understand the concerns and needs of growers who export their crops internationally.”

She adds, “Of course, growers are spending smartly. Production and trade around the world is influenced by EU and UN regulations otherwise it could result in losses with fruit stuck between the countries of supply and the countries of demand.”

Product positioning

Next year will mark Suterra’s 40^th anniversary. “So, our experience developing new products and educating growers on the potential of sustainable biocontrol is significant,” Gamarra says. “The concept of mating disruption is relatively new for those farmers who had no reason to explore pest control strategies beyond conventional insecticide. However, those growers who export have a better understanding and higher use of mating disruption products.” 

That is because growers who export to the EU have already had to reduce their dependence on conventional chemical pesticides with higher levels of hazardous active substances.

At Suterra, “Semiochemicals are the basis of our work since we synthesize pheromones for the sustainable biocontrol of pests. Semiochemicals were excluded from the EFSA guide as they present low risk and have a non-toxic mode of action.” 

She continues, “These have two main characteristics that perhaps no other control tool has. The first is that they are substances that are naturally present in nature and that do not generate resistance because they have been used for millenniums to communicate between insects. The second is that they are very specific. They only affect the individual pest species that you want to control and are safe for workers and beneficial species. These products do not kill, what they do is avoid pest mating.

Suterra’s products reduce the use of pesticides and don’t affect bees and other pollinator populations in agriculture. They also save time, money, and resources, after the season the products can be recycled leaving no residues in the field,” Gamarra pitches.