United Kingdom
September 23, 2008
Plant Health Care
(AIM: PHC.L), a leading provider of natural products to the
agriculture and landscape industries, announces that independent
trials of PreTect, the Harpin based foliar fertiliser, have
resulted in impressive yield gains across a variety of crops.
The trials were undertaken in Spain, by SICOP a Spanish
government approved trials agency, over the past 12 months as
part of government required efficacy tests. The results of tests
on olives, tomatoes, strawberries and lettuce showed significant
improvements across a number of key metrics.
These trial results were the final requirement for full
registration of Harpin across all crops in Spain and will enable
PHC to make shelf life and vigor claims in that market.
When a small amount of PreTect was applied to tomatoes, it led
to an increase in flowering and fruiting maturity, and an
increase of 2.6% in yield and over 20% in the key category of
firmness. The increase in firmness is the parameter that
dictates the shelf-life of tomatoes and therefore helps reduce
wastage and increase farmers’ profits. There were over 3.6
million tonnes of tomatoes produced in Spain in 2007.
Tests on olives showed an increase of 3.3% in yield and 5.4% in
fruit size and most importantly a significant increase in oil
content. There are currently around six million acres of olives
harvested in Spain per year.
Results on lettuce indicated increases in yield of 4.3% per
lettuce head and strawberries showed average increases of 5.8%.
John Brady, CEO of Plant Health Care commented, “These results
further validate the efficacy of PreTect following the
announcement in June 2008 of its successful trials across a
variety of soft fruits.
“A wealth of data has shown that PreTect offers an effective
method of increasing the yield and shelflife of a variety of
crops.
These results help to further position Plant Health Care as a
key player in the worldwide effort to increase food production
and quality while also reducing synthetic chemical use.” |
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