Chemical Controversies
Pesticides are substances that prevent, destroy, repel, or reduce the severity of pests. Pests are living things that occur where they are not wanted or that cause damage to humans, crops, or animals. Pests can be insects, rodents, unwanted plants, bacteria, viruses, or different types of fungus. Pesticides can vary in how toxic they are to humans and the environment. Some are persistent in the environment, animals, and birds, lasting for years; others break down soon after they are released. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) grants licenses, or registrations, to pesticides that it has found do not pose unreasonable risks to human health and the environment; it has registered at least 865 pesticides, which are used in thousands of pesticide products.
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Viewpoint: Sri Lanka economic crisis deepens as recently-imposed chemical fertilizer ban stirs inflation in a country already suffering from the pandemic
An ill-advised ban on the use of chemical fertilisers and pesticides, combined with pandemic-induced contraction of the economy and decline ...
Sri Lanka’s plan to go ‘all organic’ and end use of synthetic chemicals leaves staple tea industry in ‘complete disarray’
Sri Lanka’s drive to become the world’s first 100 percent organic food producer threatens its prized tea industry and has ...
Viewpoint: ‘Neonicotinoids and other seed treatments are a precise tool and critical component of safe, integrated pest management practices’ — American Seed Association challenges ‘misunderstandings’
Treated seeds have been widely adopted by growers for two key reasons: 1. They are a highly effective tool for farmers ...
Infographic: Does consuming micro-traces of glyphosate (aka Roundup) in our food cause cancer? All 20 global regulatory and chemical oversight agencies say ‘no’, while anti-biotech activists spin the data
Glyphosate weedkiller, once marketed exclusively under the name RoundUp by its originator Monsanto, is the world's most popular herbicide, used ...
Viewpoint: Here’s how activist scientists use exaggerated fears of trace chemicals as a subterfuge to try to derail crop biotechnology
Environmental Health published on August 3, 2021 “Commentary: Novel strategies and new tools to curtail the health effects of pesticides” ...
Video: Are pesticides harmful or bad for biodiversity? Challenging 5 widely-held myths
Below, you will find five of the most common myths about pesticides, and the truth about them. MYTH: Pesticides are ...
Viewpoint: The biggest threat to our food supply is not chemicals but chemophobia
My cousin is a baking whiz, and runs her own cookie enterprise. The recipes happen to call for potato flour ...
GLP Podcast: ‘Big Fears, Little Risks’ — Documentary featuring GLP experts tackles GMO, vaccine skepticism
The evidence is in: genetic engineering promotes sustainable farming; vaccines save lives; and nuclear energy is our best hope of ...
Viewpoint: Politics — not science — driving Canadian policy decisions over glyphosate and other agricultural tools
Ahead of a federal election call, three [Canadian] federal ministers called a halt to a process that would likely have ...
First global index of pollinator population changes: Habitat loss and land management are primary drivers, with pesticides last
The top three global causes of pollinator loss are habitat destruction, followed by land management – primarily the grazing, fertilizers ...
Does paraquat cause Parkinson’s disease? An academic review of reviews says ‘no’
To examine the extent to which a consensus exists in the scientific community regarding the relationship between exposure to paraquat ...
Study: Glyphosate residues in food are not only below legal limits, they are ‘well below the amount that can be ingested daily over a lifetime with a reasonable certainty of no harm’
Glyphosate is the active ingredient in Roundup® brand nonselective herbicides, and residue testing for food has been conducted as part of ...
Montreal becomes first Canadian jurisdiction to ban glyphosate
Montreal will be the first municipality in North America to completely ban the sale of more than 100 pesticide products ...
Viewpoint: ‘The debate on glyphosate in Canada is populist, chaotic, political and simply unsettling’
Canadians had until July 20 to comment on the federal government’s proposal to increase the amount of glyphosate herbicide residue ...
California appeals court upholds $86 million dollar glyphosate cancer verdict
Bayer lost a third appeal against U.S. court verdicts that awarded damages to customers blaming their cancers on use of ...
‘War on glyphosate’ and the unintended negative environmental consequences of the demonization of a safe and effective herbicide and its removal from the garden market
Across social media they celebrated. The electronic victory laps commemorated Bayer’s decision to remove the herbicide Roundup from the residential ...
Crop Chemophobia II: When activist journalists twist science in support of ideology
Attacking pesticides is sexy. Many activists, lawyers and journalists have made careers out of propagating a simple, compelling narrative about ...
Crop chemophobia I: Pesticides are vital to organic and conventional agriculture — but they can be misused. Here’s how to distinguish between legitimate concerns and anti-science propaganda
It seems not a month goes by without an “investigative reporter” somewhere on the internet warning about the dangers of ...
Nature study finds growth and body composition of Zebra finches are ‘positively impacted’ by early life exposure to low doses of neonicotinoids
Neonicotinoids are insecticides widely used as seed treatments that appear to have multiple negative effects on birds at a diversity ...
Facing 30,000 unresolved cancer claims, Bayer plans to pull glyphosate from US lawn and garden market by 2023
German drugs and chemicals giant [Bayer] has repeatedly failed to put the Roundup woes behind it. Bayer inherited the legal ...
Viewpoint: It’s time for a reassessment of the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC)’s role in sabotaging glyphosate, one of the world’s most popular — and safest — herbicides
As we’re in the midst of a reevaluation of whether the Virology Laboratory in Wuhan, China was the true source ...
‘What isn’t an endocrine disruptor?’ Silent Spring Institute claims hundreds of common chemicals cause breast cancer — but the science is lacking
A study by the Silent Spring Institute (1), with funding from the politically sympathetic National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences ...
Viewpoint: ‘Europe has abandoned science-based assessments’ — Kenya and the rest of Africa face economic devastation, mass starvation if they adopt proposal to ban all products banned in the EU
It is hard to remember any decision that posed harm to Kenya as much as the recommendation before Parliament that ...
Viewpoint: ‘Well intentioned’ Sri Lankan plan to embrace organic farming tainted by lack of science, damaging its economy, health, and food security
In Sri Lanka, world renowned for its tea production, an initiative to go all-organic — the textbook definition of a ...
Viewpoint: Warning to Sri Lanka — Tunnel vision embrace of an organic-only farming model sets country up for economic and environmental backwardness
An Open Letter to Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa: Your recent endeavor to ‘rush’ the country from conventional farming to ...
Viewpoint: ‘Glyphosate is socially dead’ — While every major government regulator in the world finds the herbicide safe, politicians have caved to activists, and farmers are the victims
The specialist authorities from France, Sweden, Hungary and the Netherlands have come to a clear conclusion when it comes to ...
GLP Podcast: ‘It’s banned in Europe’ fallacy, debunked; Conversation’s bad glyphosate article; Fighting pregnancy stress
If a pesticide is banned in Europe, does that make it dangerous? Nope. Typically an excellent source of science commentary, ...
