On Thursday 26 July, civil society organisations such as the Health and Environment Alliance (HEAL), Pesticide Action Network (PAN) Europe, Nature et Progrès Belgique, WeMove.EU and SumofUs announced that they had officially applied before the Court of Justice of the European Union to join the legal challenge initiated by the Brussels Region against the decision to renew the authorisation licence for glyphosate.
The Brussels Regional government is committed to a “zero pesticides” policy and banned the use of glyphosate on its territory. Its legal challenge was introduced on 12 December 2017 for violation of the precautionary principle (see EUROPE 11981).
Referring to a scientific recommendation from the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) at the WHO, Genon K. Jensen, HEAL’s Executive Director, pointed out in a press release that, “There are well-founded concerns about glyphosate”. She also said, “We absolutely support public authorities like the Brussels Region who promote a phase out of toxic pesticides – they shouldn’t be hindered in their efforts to put health first”.
Martin Dermine, from PAN Europe added, “The Brussels Region is a front runner with regards to the protection of citizens and the environment against pesticides. We intend to support them as we consider that, based on science, glyphosate should not have been re-approved as it is a probable carcinogen”.
A majority of these NGOs were behind the European Citizens’ Initiative “Stop Glyphosate”, to which the European Commission considers it responded last March by proposing a revision of the EU general regulation on food (178/2002/EC) to increase transparency, quality and independence in the pesticide authorisation procedure in the EU (see EUROPE 11999).
To improve this procedure, the European Parliament's special PEST committee will make its recommendations in view of a vote on 6 December. (Original version in French by Aminata Niang)