Colombia has no standalone biostimulant class. The term _bioestimulante_ exists only as a glossary definition (NTC 1927 §2.1.10) — it isn't a registrable category. Every biostimulant therefore has to be forced into one of two adjacent frameworks depending on its composition and label claims: fertiliser or plant protection product.

The competent authority throughout is ICA (Instituto Colombiano Agropecuario), specifically its Dirección Técnica de Inocuidad e Insumos Agrícolas.

Possible way of placing a plant biostimulant onto the Colombian market :

Route 1 — Fertiliser / soil conditioner (Resolution 150 of 2003, amended by Res. 968 of 2010): This is where non-microbial, chemical/organic products land: seaweed and algal extracts, amino acids, protein hydrolysates, humic/fulvic acids. The trap is the minimum guaranteed content in Anexo 11 — roughly ≥3% each for N, P₂O₅ and K₂O, ≥5% for secondary elements, with floors for micronutrients and amino acids. Anything below the floor can't be declared in the composición garantizada or on the label (Art. 42), and since a biostimulant's mode of action isn't nutritional, it often has nothing "garantizable" to anchor the registration. Efficacy trials are also generally mandatory here: Art. 17's exemption covers recognised NPK sources and well-known conditioners but explicitly not "nuevas tecnologías," so a biostimulant claim falls outside it.

Route 2 — Bioinputs (Resolution 68370 of 2020, which derogated the relevant parts of Res. 698 of 2011). This is the home for microbial products, and nominally for plant/algal extracts and biochemicals. Two remarks here:

- The inoculante biológico definition qualifies microorganisms "sin tener en cuenta su valor hormonal o estimulante" — i.e. registration rests on the microbial mechanism (N-fixation, P-solubilisation, etc.), not on any biostimulation claim.

- Extracto vegetal and productos bioquímicos are defined under biocontroladores (pest control), so a plant/biochemical extract used for physiological stimulation rather than pest control doesn't cleanly meet those definitions.

A purely mineral or hormonal stimulant with no microbial component and no pest-control action essentially has no home in either framework.

Also, under 068370, efficacy trials are mandatory and territorial — the protocol must cover two different agroecological zones (Art. 11), and trials run outside Colombia are not homologated (Parágrafo 1). Company registration must precede product registration, and importer registration only permits import of already-registered finished products.

Practical classification (claims are usually decisive — a nutrition/nutrient-efficiency claim keeps a product in fertiliser/bioinput space, a disease-control claim risks tipping it into pesticide regulation):

_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Product | Likely route

Seaweed extract, amino acids, protein hydrolysate. | Fertiliser

Humic / fulvic acids | Soil conditionner

bacillus, trichoderma, mycorrhizae, PGPR, consortia | Bioinput

Pest-control claims | Possibly pesticide registration

_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Labelling for the fertiliser route sits in Chapter X of Res. 150; Art. 40 incorporates NTC 40 by reference. The approved dossier label is the only one usable in marketing, and the declared guaranteed composition must match what ICA approved.

Timelines (unofficial): ~2–6 months for conventional fertilisers, ~4–12 months for microbial bioinputs; fertiliser sales registrations are generally of indefinite validity.

Note: this section is kept under review and will be updated as amendments enter into force. Resolution 150/2003 has been amended more than once, dedicated rules for biopreparados de uso agrícola are under preparation by ICA, and the current status of Resolution 068370 should be verified before use in a dossier.

Are you planning to place your product onto the market in Colombia?

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We wish you a beautiful day,

The sciBASICS Team.