02/December/21

 

The preliminary EU report on glyphosate prepared by the Dutch, Hungarian, French and Swedish regulatory agencies fails to take account of the vast majority of recent studies published in the peer-reviewed scientific literature, according to a report by the association Générations Futures. The preliminary EU report (RAR, for "Renewal Assessment Report") would allow the reauthorisation of the controversial herbicide in Europe at the end of 2022. According to Générations Futures, out of 7,188 studies published in scientific journals, only 30 studies, equivalent to 0.4% of the studies they found, were judged by the RAR to be relevant and reliable without qualification. GMWatch

 

 

Researchers connected to Global2000, an independent Austrian environmental organisation, have found that 33 out of 35 studies that Bayer submitted to EU assessors for the preliminary safety review of glyphosate were incomplete. Global2000 found, using globally established OECD test guidelines for industry studies on pesticides, that only two studies were reliable as defined by the OECD. Another 15 were "partly reliable", and 18 were not reliable. Nonetheless, the EU assessors still concluded that glyphosate is safe. EUObserver; comment by GMWatch

 

 

The California Supreme Court has rejected a request by Bayer AG for review of the August 2021 First District Court of Appeal (San Francisco) ruling, for the plaintiffs, that Monsanto knowingly marketed a product — Roundup — whose active ingredient (glyphosate) could be dangerous. The $87 million in damages awarded to the plaintiffs in the litigation, Alberta and Alva Pilliod, has thus survived Bayer’s challenge. This highest state court decision racks up another loss for Bayer (which now owns the Monsanto “Roundup” brand) — despite its dogged insistence, throughout multiple lawsuits (with many more still in the pipeline), that glyphosate is safe. Beyond Pesticides

 

 

In a new report, ethicists say the UK’s embrace of gene-edited food must not be used to prolong or worsen existing animal welfare problems in farming, such as using greater disease resistance as an excuse to crowd animals more densely together. Another example the report gives is that gene-editing to increase food-production, such as making species mature faster, should avoid replicating welfare issues created by selective breeding, such as fast-growing chickens having leg problems. New Scientist