The future of glyphosate, the active ingredient in Roundup and other weedkillers, is still uncertain after the European Commission failed yet again to re-licence its use earlier this week.
A standing committee of experts from EU member states was due to reach a decision on Monday on a temporary 18-month re-extension for glyphosate-based products – but instead recorded ‘no opinion’.
The commission will now take the temporary re-extension proposal to an appeals committee (which does not comprise experts) on 20 June, a process that allows member states to explain their positions. If no consensus is reached, the college of 28 commissioners will make the final decision.
Some observers say the commission could choose not to act at all – in which case authorisation would lapse when the current licence expires on 30 June. A timetable for withdrawal of glyphosate products from the shelves would then follow, probably over six months – which would allow the pro-glyphosate lobby a window of opportunity to frame new proposals that might be acceptable to member states.
However, Gary Philpott, UK business director for lawn and garden, the manufacturers of glyphosate and suppliers of Roundup, believes the commission will want to grant the 18-month extension, so that the evidence can be properly re-evaluated. “There is nothing in the evidence that would warrant not renewing the licence for the full 15 years” he told GTN Xtra this week.
He said Monsanto was frustrated and disappointed that the re-licencing process had become “a political football”.
Twenty countries were in favour of a renewal this week, but they accounted for only 52.91% of the EU population. Germany, France, Italy, Greece, Austria, Portugal and Luxembourg abstained (representing 47.01%). Only Malta voted against.
Controversy has surrounded the re-licensing process since the World Health Organisation’s International Agency for Research on Cancer and the European Food Safety Authority came to opposite conclusions about whether glyphosate was a possible human carcinogen. IARC said it was “probable”, while EFSA concluded it was “unlikely”.
It’s the consequent confusion over apparently conflicting and highly complex research and the associated methodolgy that has now produced legislative stalemate. The uncertainty is a major concern for Monsanto, which would face a massive loss of revenue were glyphosate to be banned; for retailers, who would lose a significant source of turnover, and for agriculture and commercial horticulture, which would lose a control for which there is currently no clear-cut alternative.
