Product remaining at the end of a season will be carried over and used the next year. This requires a product to have a reasonable shelf life. Fumigant nematicides typically provide a rapid kill with little or no residual activity while organophosphates and carbamates may not kill immediately or at all but provide continuous nemastatic activity for several weeks after application. In some cases, soil microorganisms may find natural products inviting food sources which will lessen their effectiveness in the soil. Commercialization will likely be more acceptable if a natural product can be produced without needing to be reared in or on another organism.
Quality control is an important component of all commercial ventures.
Living organisms and resulting products could be more difficult to produce uniformly than traditional chemicals. Potency must often be determined via a bioassay procedure utilizing living organisms rather than via a standardized chemical test. Media on which living organisms are reared is often not specific to a particular organism and extreme care must be taken to assure contamination of product does not occur. Traditional chemicals are typically marketed by experienced agricultural companies which produce and sell a variety of agricultural products. In contrast, in many cases natural products which have been sold in California have been developed by relatively small concerns which may have a viable product but little experience in marketing through agricultural channels.