The Slovenian Institute of Hop Research and Brewing (IHPS) has started the trials to evaluate the efficacy of a biofertilizer (BF) based hop compost enriched with biocontrol agents (BCAs) against Verticillium wilt in hop fields contaminated by Verticillium nonalfalfae.

These field trials are part of the SUSTEMICROP project (PRIMA 2021 Section 2) and are the result of the collaboration between IHPS (which has participated with the isolation of a BCA and the design and execution of the field trials), the University of León (ULE, Spain) which has collaborated in the isolation of 2 BCAs, and the Spanish company Agrogenia Biotech (Córdoba) (https://www.agrogenia.es/) which has participated in the multiplication of the microbial biomass of the BCAs.

 The effectiveness of BF in the control of verticillosis in hops will be evaluated in the coming months