Monsanto and the Poisoning of Europe

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21. As EU Weighs Approval, More Evidence Industry is Rigging the Glyphosate Game

Published on
Wednesday, May 18, 2016
byCommon Dreams

Suspicious donation from Monsanto emerges after WHO seemingly flipped in its assessment of the dangers posed by the chemical

byLauren McCauley, staff writer

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Monsanto's Roundup relabeled by activists from Global Justice Now, 28th April 2016. The main active ingredient is glyphosate. (Photo: Global Justice Now /Flickr/CC)

As European officials on Wednesday weigh whether or not to re-approve the use of Monsanto's glyphosate, a storm has erupted after the World Health Organization (WHO) seemingly flipped in its assessment of the dangers posed by the chemical.

Ahead of this week's European Commission meeting, which could approve the use of glyphosate for up to nine years, the United Nation’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and the WHO released a joint summary report concluding that the chemical, a favored ingredient of agrochemical producers like Monsanto and Dow, was "unlikely to pose a carcinogenic risk to humans from exposure through the diet."

These findings were widely (and inaccurately) reported as a "clean bill of health" for a pesticide once declared to be "probably carcinogenic" for humans by the WHO's International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC).

What's more, documents obtained by the anti-GMO watchdog group U.S. Right to Know found that one of the chairs of the UN's Joint Meeting on Pesticide Residues (JMPR) had, in another capacity, received a six-figure donation from Monsanto.

The Guardian reported on Tuesday:

Professor Alan Boobis, who chaired the UN’s joint FAO/WHO meeting on glyphosate, also works as the vice-president of the International Life Science Institute (ILSI) Europe. The co-chair of the sessions was Professor Angelo Moretto, a board member of ILSI’s Health and Environmental Services Institute, and of its Risk21 steering group too, which Boobis also co-chairs.

In 2012, the ILSI group took a $500,000 (£344,234) donation from Monsanto and a $528,500 donation from the industry group Croplife International, which represents Monsanto, Dow, Syngenta and others, according to documents obtained by the US right to know campaign.

Those opposed to the chemical's re-approval in Europe said the exposed "conflict of interest" in the FAO/WHO report should disqualify it from consideration. The EU's deliberations, which are expected to last two days, were postponed in March after a wave of public opposition forced lawmakers to renege on their approval.

"The timing of the release of this report by the FAO/WHO could be described as cynical if it weren’t such a blatantly political and ham-fisted attempt to influence the EU decision later this week on the approval of glyphosate," said Green MEP Bart Staes.

"Any decision affecting millions of people should be based on fully transparent and independent science that isn’t tied to corporate interests," said Greenpeace EU food policy director Franziska Achterberg. "It would be irresponsible to ignore the warnings on glyphosate and to re-licence this pesticide without any restrictions to protect the public and the environment."

"On one side," Dodwell continued, "there are powerful agribusiness companies like Monsanto, whose Roundup weed killer contains glyphosate and accounts for a third of its total sales. And on the other side you have over a million citizens from across the EU who have signed petitions saying that they don’t want to be exposed to chemicals that are probably causing cancer."

Full article: http://www.commondreams.org/news/2016/05/18/eu-weighs-approval-more-evidence-industry-rigging-glyphosate-game