An EU court ruled [March 7] that European lawmakers must be given access to scientific studies examining the safety of glyphosate, a chemical commonly used in pesticides whose possibly carcinogenic nature has raised global controversy.
The ruling by the EU’s General Court could reinvigorate debate over glyphosate in the EU, which has seen an EU-wide petition to ban the product rejected by the bloc’s executive arm and raised questions of transparency.
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Four EU lawmakers — Finland’s Heidi Hautala, Hungary’s Benedek Javor, France’s Michele Rivasi and Belgium’s Bart Staes — filed the case in May 2017 against the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA), which had used toxicological and carcinogenic studies to determine the safety of glyphosate, finding that “glyphosate is unlikely to pose a carcinogenic hazard to humans.”
While the European Commission used the findings to classify the chemical as safe, lawmakers were denied access to the same studies, based on the argument that it could harm the commercial interests of companies that presented the studies.
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With the release of the data, other scientists can also view the procedures and attempt to replicate and verify the conclusions.
Read full, original article: Glyphosate: EU agency must release censored study, court says
