Brussels bows to the agricultural lobby:renewed the use of glyphosate for 10 years

Europe will allow the use of glyphosate within the Union for another 10 years.The European Commission established this "on the basis of comprehensive safety assessments conducted by the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) and the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA)" together "with the Member States".While for years there has been discussion on the impact on biodiversity and, above all, on the food risks for consumers produced by glyphosate - classified by the WHO International Agency for Research on Cancer as potentially carcinogenic in 2015 -, a group of European chemical multinationals with strong commercial interests in the most used herbicide in the world (among which the names of Bayer, Syngenta and Nufarm stand out) had made a request for an extension.And now they will be satisfied.In the press release announcing the decision, the Commission wrote that the use of glyphosate will in any case be subordinated "to some new conditions and restrictions", making it known that, if evidence emerges "indicating that the approval criteria will no longer be met", "a review of the approval" may be initiated at any time.

Formally, the EU executive is required to adopt a decision before 15 December 2023, when the current approval period expires.Brussels announced that will automatically renew the authorization of the pesticide after the required qualified majority was not reached in the context of a vote of the appeal committee of the European Commission for Plants, Animals, Food and Feed (SCoPAFF).In fact, the representatives of 17 states spoke in favor of the authorization, 3 countries voted against it and 7 abstained.Among the latter there is theItaly, which in a previous vote on 13 October was instead declared favorable.Diplomatic sources explained that our country, after the yes vote a month ago, had specified in the minutes that the use of glyphosate should be prohibited, making this ban explicit in the text, for any use as part of the pre-harvest.Since this request was not implemented in the basic text, Italy would therefore have decided to abstain.

Last July, the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA), although admitting that it had not been able to adequately assess the range of risks for consumers and the environment, had given a new green light to the herbicide glyphosate ensuring that the use of the substance does not raise "critical concerns", which arise only when they concern "all proposed uses of the active substance being evaluated, thus preventing its approval or renewal".The same agency had in fact declared that they would not be available harmonized assessment methodologies nor sufficient information.However, regarding the impact of glyphosate on health, many independent scientific studies have reached very different conclusions, raising alarm bells.

Meanwhile, just a month ago in France, 16-year-old Théo Grataloup has obtained a lifetime compensation for a series of malformations of the trachea, larynx and esophagus induced by exposure to the herbicide.The young man's mother, when she was pregnant with him, in fact managed a riding school of 700 square meters of sandy area which was periodically weeded using a glyphosate-based product.Last year, experts from the Fund for Compensation for Pesticide Victims recognized "the possible causal link between the pathology that emerged and theexposure to pesticides during the prenatal period due to the professional activity of one or two parents".It was the first case of compensation recognized for this reason.

[by Stefano Baudino]