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.
Below is the complete archive of related articles sorted by date.
273 Colombian farmers sue government spraying glyphosate to destroy coca plants used to make cocaine
The Colombian government faces 273 lawsuits stemming from damages to crops, land and water caused by the spraying the herbicide ...
Viewpoint: Why a jury verdict against Monsanto doesn’t change anything regarding the safety of Roundup herbicide
The common weed killer Roundup (glyphosate) is back in the news after a US court ruled it contributed to a man’s terminal cancer (non-Hodgkin ...
Legal challenges expected after EPA re-authorizes controversial weed-killing herbicide dicamba
Farmers can use the pesticide dicamba to clear fields of stubborn weeds for two more growing seasons after the EPA ...
Plaintiff accepts reduced damages in first glyphosate-cancer trial, Bayer to appeal verdict
A Northern California groundskeeper said [October 31] that he will accept a judge’s reduced verdict of $78 million against Monsanto ...
Can biotechnology help protect the world’s chocolate supply?
[K]eeping pace with global cravings can be a tall order for chocolate producers — a challenge made even tougher as ...
Replacing neonicotinoid pesticides is no easy task, Canadian farmers say
In 2015, the Canadian province [Ontario] instituted regulations requiring farmers to prove they have soil pest populations in corn and ...
6 things agroecology can do for farming and the environment
Agroecology has returned to the global spotlight, as one approach to bring farmers closer to meeting challenges [like rising food ...
Environmental Working Group or the EPA: Who should parents trust about glyphosate safety?
Remember a couple months back when an advocacy group found what it called “a hefty dose” of glyphosate, the active ingredient in weedkillers such ...
EU delays decision to re-approve ‘toxic’ copper compounds, widely used as pesticides in organic farming
EU countries have delayed a decision on whether or not to reauthorize the use of copper compounds — chemical substances ...
Despite FDA safety data, media promote glyphosate scare stories to drive readership, farmer says
FDA Testing Finds No Glyphosate Residues in Over Half of Commodities Tested. And what they did find was well within ...
Announcing appeal of reaffirmed Roundup-cancer verdict, Bayer develops defense strategy of Monsanto’s flagship product
Bayer AG’s $63 billion acquisition of Monsanto .... made the German drug and chemicals company the world’s biggest supplier of crop seeds and ...
Viewpoint: Chemophobia epidemic—Fanning fears about trace chemicals obscures real risks and ‘damages public health’
When is a chemical dangerous? This is not a question we consciously ask ourselves much, but in fact, we interrogate ...
Using gene editing to control forest fires? It could be a reality if anti-biotechnology activists don’t block it
The American west has experienced devastating wildfires in recent years; while the number of fires has decreased a little over ...
Judge upholds landmark glyphosate-cancer verdict, cuts punitive damages 84% to $39 million
A California judge has rejected Monsanto’s appeal to overturn a landmark jury verdict which found that its popular herbicide causes cancer. The ...
Argentina approves first drought-resistant, herbicide-tolerant GMO soybean
The Argentine government approved the first soy that is tolerant to drought and that also combines better weed control by ...
Viewpoint: FDA pesticide report should alleviate public fears of chemicals in food, but no one is listening
The International Food Information Council Foundation’s (IFIC) 2018 Food & Health survey identified carcinogens or cancer-causing chemicals in food as ...
There are literally no more studies we can do to show glyphosate is safe, expert says
Several days ago I wrote a column about the wrong-headed claim that glyphosate is a carcinogen and the huge number of tort ...
Oxitec, Gates Foundation aim to curb pesticide-resistant insects, malaria with new ‘self-limiting mosquito’
Oxitec [a] UK-based biotechnology company ..... [October 18] announced that it is expanding its collaboration with the Bill & Melinda ...
Mother Nature? More like ‘Mad Scientist Mama’—creator of chemicals good and bad for humans
Nature is not some sort of cosmic mother figure. On the contrary, nature is composed of diverse biological and physical ...
After successful demonization campaign against herbicide glyphosate, anti-GMO activists and environmental groups take aim at atrazine
In July, the US Environmental Protection Agency issued an extensive report that reviewed decades of science and declared that a ...
Sustainability failure: Anti-GMO France’s 10-year effort to slash pesticide use boosted spraying by 12%
In 2008, the French government announced a dramatic shift in agricultural policy, calling for pesticide use to be slashed in ...
Viewpoint: It’s time to replace our fear-based genetic engineering regulations
In the early 1970s a group of scientists -- none involved in agriculture or food -- raised concerns about the ...
Viewpoint: Europe has traded crop biotechnology for ‘faith-based’ agroecology
We are living in a new Dark Age in Europe where innovation and technology are being rejected at an alarming ...
Viewpoint: Should we be concerned that three biotech companies may control 70 percent of agrochemical industry?
In the past two years alone, three major corporate mergers have begun to reshape what was an already concentrated international ...
Viewpoint: How anti-GMO activist-journalist Carey Gillam primes the glyphosate litigation pump
The Guardian published an article by Sam Levin and Carey Gillam [on October 7] about the “new era of cancer lawsuits ...
Billionaires and Bacteria are Racing to Save Us From Death by Fertilizer
It was January 15, 1881, and the U.S. envoy to Peru had to duck for cover .... Chile had invaded Peru ...
‘Gold standard’ assessing neonicotinoids: Field bee hive studies find pesticides not major source of health issues
Some lab studies but almost no field ones suggest neonicotinoid pesticides are harming bee health. Why is there such a ...
