During a debate in the European Parliament on Wednesday 4 October, MEPs on both sides of the Chamber were once again divided over the Commission’s proposal to renew the authorisation of the active substance glyphosate in the EU for a further 10 years, leaving it up to the Member States to take measures to mitigate the risks. However, only the Greens/EFA and The Left Groups are united in calling, in the name of the precautionary principle, for Parliament to vote in favour of a ban on this highly controversial total herbicide, the most widely used in Europe and the world.
An objection will be lodged by the Greens/EFA, who are very concerned about biodiversity and the fact that ECHA has not retained all the cancer studies, said Germany’s Jutta Paulus.
While the majority of the EPP, ECR and ID Groups support the proposal, the majority of the S&D Group is against it and Renew Europe says it wants a revised proposal.
The European Commissioner for Health, Stella Kyriakides, reiterated that her draft implementing regulation was based on “an in-depth risk analysis” by the four rapporteur Member States and the EFSA, which “did not identify any areas of critical concern”, she pointed out.
Taking the view that the Commission had been cautious in proposing 10 years rather than 15, she gave assurances that there would be ongoing monitoring and that “in the event of new data”, the Commission would act immediately to withdraw the authorisation.
And to affirm: “The Member States, the Commission and the Agencies (EFSA and ECHA: Editor’s note) acted in accordance with the law and in full transparency. Science prevails”.
On behalf of the EU Council, Spain’s acting Secretary of State, Pascual Navarro Ríos, takes the same line. He called for “recognition of the value of the work of the EFSA, whose independence was strengthened in 2019”, and said he was “convinced that the EFSA and the Member States will follow scientific progress by examining all aspects and will review the decision, if necessary, to ensure food safety and environmental protection”.
He pointed out that work was progressing on the proposed Regulation on the ‘Sustainable Use of Pesticides’, and that the Member States had called for the approval procedure for non-chemical pesticides to be sped up.
Peter Liese (EPP, German) cited food safety as a reason for supporting the proposal. “If we withdraw a major pesticide, it will cost even more to produce food”, he argued. Mazaly Aguilar (ECR, Spanish) makes the same argument.
Jiří Pospíšil (EPP, Czech), for his part, said he was against the proposal in view of “doubts about the safety of glyphosate”, which called for “caution”.
In addition to its links with Parkinson’s disease, to which farmers are particularly vulnerable, glyphosate is bad for agriculture and biodiversity, stressed Mohammed Chahim (S&D, Dutch). “Some birds can’t find their nests, and bees are deprived of nectar-producing flowers. It is irresponsible to wait until we are 100% sure that glyphosate is harmful before banning it”.
According to Pascal Canfin (Renew Europe, French), “a 10-year renewal with no conditions on restrictions on use is unacceptable”. “We are waiting for a new, more balanced proposal to allow restrictions on use”, he said.
“How many deaths do you need to ban it (glyphosate: Editor’s note), even though the WHO has classified it as a probable human carcinogen, more than 10,000 complaints have been lodged in the United States and Bayer has paid out billions of euros to compensate the victims of Round up. Who are we kidding, Mrs Kyriakides?”, said Michèle Rivasi (Greens/EFA, French) to the European Commissioner. It should be recalled that the co-formulants in the finished product make the active substance 1,000 times more dangerous.
This did not faze Mrs Kyriakides, who said that “the European Commission always applies the precautionary principle, which is why an in-depth risk assessment has been carried out since the first authorisation, as in 2017, and for this renewal proposal”. (Original version in French by Aminata Niang)