glyphosate

Monsanto sued California’s Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment (OEHHA), demanding that the agency not add glyphosate to the state’s list of known carcinogens, reports Reuters.

Looking back nearly two decades to the commercial introduction of GMO crops in 1996, Monsanto executive vice president Robb Fraley says the avid adoption by farmers of the technology exceeded his expectations. "They've been the fastest-adopted tool in the history of agriculture," Fraley told the Minneapolis Star-Tribune. He also said, "I wouldn’t have believed in 1980 (the dawn of genetic engineering) that we’d still be talking about GMO crops and still having some of the controversies that we face today."

The European Food Safety Authority (EFSA), which advises EU policy makers, says glyphosate, the most widely used weedkiller in the world, is unlikely to cause cancer in humans, said Reuters. The finding is contrary to the conclusion of WHO's cancer agency in March that glyphosate, the main ingredient in Monsanto's herbicide Roundup, is "probably carcinogenic to humans."

Monsanto told California regulators that they should withdraw their proposal to add the weedkiller glyphosate to a state list of chemicals known to cause cancer, said Reuters. The state Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment unveiled the plan in September and said it was required following an assessment by a World Health Organization agency that the chemical is a probable carcinogen in humans.

"It's inevitable that glyphosate is all wound up in GMOs," writes Tamar Haspel in the Washington Post. Many of the strains of GMO crops on the market were designed to tolerate the herbicide, so the crops survive when the chemical is sprayed in fields to kill weeds.

Kansas, often the No. 1 wheat state, is the latest hot spot for emergence of herbicide-resistant weeds.

A state environmental agency in California says it intends to list glyphosate, the most widely used weedkiller in the world, "as known to the state to cause cancer" under the so-called Proposition 65 law.

In a column in the New England Journal of Medicine, two scientists called for a new U.S. safety assessment of glyphosate, the most widely used herbicide in the world, said Reuters.

The widely used herbicide glyphosate "could get a new life in Europe after being deemed safe by a key assessment largely based on classified industry papers," says the Guardian.

The International Agency for Research on Cancer, a WHO agency, plans a meeting from Oct. 6-13 in Lyon, France, to discuss red meat and processed meat.

The USDA said it has decided to approve cultivation of cotton that has been genetically engineered by Dow AgroScience to tolerate the weedkiller 2,4-D as well as glyphosate, the most widely used herbicide in the world, said Agri-Pulse.

A coalition of nine environmental and consumer groups says it submitted more than 500,000 comments in opposition to a Dow weedkiller that combines the herbicides glyphosate and 2,4-D. The Environmental Protection Agency says it hopes to make a final decision later this year, "perhaps by late summer or early fall," on the Enlist Duo weedkiller. It tentatively has decided the herbicide is safe for use.

The Just Label It campaign for mandatory labeling of food made with genetically modified organisms "rolled out a trio of academics on Wednesday in a bid to raise public awareness of the public health and environmental costs of herbicides used in the production of genetically engineered crops," said Agri-Pulse.

Two of the most widely used herbicides, glyphosate and atrazine, will be part of a nationwide evaluation of the effects of 16 chemicals on 1,500 endangered plants and animals...

The EPA should conduct "an urgent re-evaluation" of glyphosate, one of the most widely used pesticides in the world, in response to a determination by a World Health Organization agency that the weedkiller is probably carcinogenic for humans, said eight environmental groups.