Plant pests and diseases remain one of agriculture's largest hidden productivity losses in 2026, forcing farmers, crop advisers, researchers and technology companies to rethink how yield is protected before harvest. The challenge reaches far beyond individual fields. The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations estimates that plant pests and diseases reduce global crop yields by 20% to 40% each year. That makes plant health not only an agronomic issue, but also a question of farm economics, agricultural trade and global food security.

The economic dimension is equally significant. FAO estimates that plant pests generate more than $220 billion in agricultural trade losses annually, while invasive pests alone cause at least $70 billion in global economic losses. Climate change adds another layer of uncertainty because changing temperatures and weather patterns can alter the intensity, geographic distribution and spread of pests and diseases. The result is a moving target: protecting yield increasingly requires anticipating problems rather than waiting until visible crop damage confirms that production has already been lost.

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That shift is especially relevant across major agricultural regions where corn, soybeans, wheat, cotton, fruits and vegetables face different combinations of weeds, insects and diseases. There is no universal response. Effective crop protection increasingly begins with correct identification, field scouting, thresholds, resistance management and agronomic practices before moving to biological or conventional crop protection products when needed. The goal is no longer simply controlling a pest. It is preventing pest pressure from turning yield potential into an economic loss.

From Pest Pressure to Yield Loss: The Battle Starts Before Harvest

The concept behind Integrated Pest Management (IPM) is increasingly important to that strategy. Rather than relying on a single intervention, IPM combines biological, cultural, physical and crop protection tools according to pest pressure and field conditions. FAO describes healthy agroecosystems as the first line of defense and emphasizes combining available pest-management techniques to maintain pest populations at economically manageable levels while minimizing unnecessary risks to people and the environment.

Source: AgroLatam analysis based on FAO plant-health and pest-management information.

But identifying a pest or disease correctly is only part of the challenge. An application can use the correct product and labeled rate and still lose part of its potential before reaching the target. Spray drift, evaporation, inadequate coverage, droplet bounce, runoff and limited penetration can influence how much of an application actually reaches and remains where it is intended to work. Our review of formulation and application technologies shows why the industry is increasingly focusing not only on the active ingredient, but on the entire journey between the spray tank and the biological target.

This issue has become increasingly visible in the United States. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's updated spray-drift guidance identifies droplet size, spray release height, wind speed and buffer zones among the factors that can significantly affect drift. EPA also encourages the incorporation of verified drift-reduction technologies into pesticide label directions when appropriate. The regulatory evolution reinforces an agronomic reality: application quality is becoming an increasingly important component of both crop protection performance and stewardship.

Source: AgroLatam analysis based on EPA spray-drift guidance and technical application research.

Droplet size illustrates how complex that equation can become. Larger droplets are generally less prone to drift, but simply maximizing droplet size is not necessarily the answer because adequate coverage still has to be maintained. EPA's applicator guidance recommends using the largest droplets capable of providing the coverage required by the treatment. Boom height, nozzle selection, pressure, wind and application volume also enter the equation. The objective is therefore not to optimize one variable in isolation, but to balance deposition, coverage and off-target movement.

This is precisely where new formulation and adjuvant technologies are gaining attention. Technical trials reviewed by AgroLatam compare aerial applications with and without specialized adjuvants and show differences in droplet-size distribution, fine-droplet formation, viscoelasticity and deposition. These are developer-generated experimental results and cannot be generalized to every product or field condition, but they illustrate the direction of current research: getting a larger share of a correctly applied treatment to remain where it is supposed to work.

Biologicals, Precision Application and Drones Change the Equation

The response to yield losses cannot be reduced to conventional crop protection products alone. Biological control, biologicals, genetics, digital scouting, predictive models, precision agriculture and conventional crop protection technologies are increasingly converging within integrated management programs. The appropriate combination depends on the crop, pest pressure, economics and local conditions. That makes the future of crop protection less about choosing between "biological" and "conventional" approaches and more about determining where each tool provides measurable agronomic value.

Agricultural drones and low-volume application systems add another layer to this transition. Using less carrier water can increase the concentration of components within the spray mixture and change compatibility, evaporation, droplet formation and deposition. Technologies reviewed by AgroLatam include experimental platforms that follow droplets from formation through transport and deposition, using wind tunnels to evaluate drift, evaporation, bounce and retention. The objective is to understand the application as an integrated system involving formulation, equipment, environmental conditions and target characteristics.

EPA's current mitigation framework provides another indication of how application technology is evolving. Depending on label requirements and application method, its mitigation options can include larger droplet sizes, lower boom heights and qualifying drift-reducing technologies. EPA's framework does not mean those measures should be universally applied; pesticide labels remain the controlling requirement. But it demonstrates how precisely managing the physical characteristics of an application is becoming part of modern crop-protection stewardship.

Source: AgroLatam analysis based on FAO and EPA guidance and crop-protection technologies reviewed by our newsroom.

One experimental example reviewed by AgroLatam shows how formulation can alter the physical interaction between a spray droplet and a target surface. In tests involving imazamox, a formulation without a built-in adjuvant recorded a contact angle of 102.4°, compared with 71.3° and 71.4° for two formulations containing different adjuvant systems. A lower contact angle indicated greater spreading across the hydrophobic test surface. The results are specific to that experiment and should not be extrapolated to all crops or herbicide applications, but they demonstrate how formulation can alter droplet behavior.

Source: AgroLatam analysis of experimental formulation data reviewed for this story.

Resistance makes this integrated approach even more important. Repeated dependence on the same control mechanism can reduce the useful life of crop-protection technologies, whether the target is a weed, pathogen or insect. Effective resistance management therefore involves more than changing products after control begins to fail. Rotation of modes of action, cultural practices, monitoring, genetics and other compatible tools can become part of a broader strategy designed to preserve efficacy while protecting yield potential.

Climate variability adds another reason to improve surveillance. FAO warns that changing climate and weather patterns are likely to affect the intensity, distribution and spread of agricultural pests, potentially exposing production areas to pressures that were historically less significant. Better field monitoring, predictive tools and communication between researchers, crop advisers and growers can therefore create economic value before an application occurs. Detecting a problem early can be substantially different from attempting to recover control after widespread crop damage has already occurred.

The larger lesson is that protecting yield can be as economically important as increasing yield potential. The next productivity gain may not come exclusively from a higher-yielding hybrid, a new active ingredient or another piece of equipment. It can also come from detecting pest pressure earlier, applying at the correct timing, managing resistance, integrating biological and conventional tools, improving formulation performance or getting more of a labeled application to the intended target.

That changes the economics of crop protection. Every bushel protected before harvest represents production that can reach the market rather than disappear somewhere between planting and the combine. As input, machinery and labor costs leave less room for inefficient operations, the next major advance in crop protection may not simply be about applying more. It may be about understanding where yield is being lost, intervening earlier and making every available tool work more precisely.