Viewpoint: Science losing out to anti-glyphosate hysteria, farmers in a quandary as there are no alternative weedkillers as effective

Confirmation [in January] by the U.S. [EPA] that glyphosate is not carcinogenic is welcome, but …. it doesn’t matter.

What does matter are two things: in 2015 the United Nations’ International Agency for Research on Cancer, the World Health Organization’s research arm, concluded that glyphosate is “probably carcinogenic to humans.”

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And Bayer, now the makers of the herbicide Roundup, which contains glyphosate, has lost three straight lawsuits with plaintiffs awarded a total of $190 million (after judgments were reduced).

Science is losing. [F]ood company Kellogg’s has decided to phase out the “use of glyphosate as a pre-harvest drying agent in its major wheat and oat supply chains by 2025.”

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[I]f the current legal and political climate prevails, pre-harvest spraying of glyphosate may be lost, not just for wheat and oats, but for other crops as well. It is likely that more companies will demand zero glyphosate residue.

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Phasing out a pre-harvest application of glyphosate, or at least, reducing its use, will be difficult. But the alternative would be much worse.

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