NAAA AGDISP Press Release Aims to Generate Additional Resources to Modernize Drift Model by Highlighting Recent Cotton Foundation

Earlier this week, NAAA issued a press release to multiple and widely circulated agricultural media sources throughout the U.S., detailing the efforts to modernize the pesticide drift model software AGDISP (Agricultural DISpersion) and the Cotton Foundation’s recent grant aiding in the modernization efforts. NAAA hopes that other pesticide stakeholder organizations and grower groups will join in supporting the modernization project. A modernized AGDISP will help in rewarding pesticide application users using proven drift reduction technologies and techniques with more regulatory flexibility.

NAAA CEO Andrew Moore will be speaking on the topic on RFD-TV at 9 a.m. CST today.

AGDISP, developed by the U.S. Forest Service in the 1980s, is used by EPA to model the movement of spray in the environment after it has been released from a sprayer. The modernization effort is being carried out by the AGDISP Modernization Project (AMP), whose goal is to update and improve AGDISP.  These improvements to AGDISP are essential to improve accuracy and make the model accessible to other software developers, so AGDISP can be further adapted to include modeling of other drift reduction technologies and application conditions to benefit all stakeholders across the pesticide industry, regardless of application type (aerial, ground, unmanned aerial, etc.).

AMP, established by NAAA two years ago, is investing $600,000 over five years to modernize AGDISP. The funding raised to date— $335,000—comes from a generous $35,000 donation from the Cotton Foundation awarded late last month; a five-year, $250,000 grant from the Centers for Disease Control via the American Mosquito Control Association; and $50,000, to date, from the National Agricultural Aviation Research and Education Foundation. The Cotton Foundation funding came through a special project focused on priority research for the cotton industry. 

A modernized AGDISP will more accurately estimate off-target spray movement for all types of pesticide applications when EPA conducts ecological, endangered species, and human health risk assessments. It will also allow the drift reduction benefits offered by new application technologies and techniques to be recognized by EPA, which in turn should result in less restrictive and more flexible application requirements on labels. A key feature of the modernized version of AGDISP is that it will continue to be available to the public and an open source. This means the EPA can use it for risk assessments and companies developing new application technologies can incorporate it into their research. Read the full press release here.