"With a focus on crop establishment and promoting early vigour for the coming season, growers are being advised to think carefully about reducing the impact of seed borne diseases. In particular there is a need to address diseases such as Microdochium nivale and the Fusarium spp in wheat which can cause a significant impact on crop establishment through a reduction in germination and vigour of the seed," says Sarah Vousden, commercial business manager with BASF.

"Levels of infection can vary considerably from season to season; for example Microdochium levels were very high in 2012, and there was  plenty of inoculum around in the 2013 crop, and it is not yet clear what levels will be for this year so it is really important to protect against any potential risk."

"This is of particular importance to those using home saved seed as home saving seed without testing always carries some risk particularly as Microdochium ear infection is not always very obvious, so just looking in the crop for ear blight will not tell you much about seed infection levels. It is important to carry out testing and also to use a suitable disinfection seed dressing such as Kinto."

"Certified seed will come pre-treated and with some suppliers you can pre-specify the seed treatment that you want. Without a doubt this is a cost worth incurring if you want to take early control of your cereal disease management."

Joe Harper of Dods of Haddington, believes that using a seed treatment such as Kinto is vital as an insurance policy. "In the cooler conditions of the north diseases such as Microdochium flourish and Kinto is a tried and tested SPD that has performed for us over the seasons irrespective of conditions."

"It is also a useful seed treatment for barley," adds Nick Wallace of Nickersons. "We have seen consistently high levels of control from Kinto against all the important seed-borne diseases in barley including smut and leaf stripe."

"It's important to recognise that although Kinto has been in the market place for some time now, it's as effective as  some of the 'newer 'products' which may mistakenly be perceived to have better activity, but we have seen no evidence of this and believe that Kinto does offer excellent control from year to year."