Please leave this field empty
Donate Monthly Make a Gift Renew Your Membership Ways to Give
Food & Water Watch Food & Water Watch Food & Water Watch
  • About
  • Problems
  • Campaigns
  • Impacts
  • Research
  • Contact
Donate Monthly Make a Gift Renew Your Membership Ways to Give
  • facebook
  • twitter
Please leave this field empty
Food & Water Watch Food & Water Watch
$
Menu
  • About
  • News
  • Research Library
  • Contact
  • Careers
  • Donate
Search
Please leave this field empty
  • facebook
  • twitter

EPA Gives Monsanto an Early Holiday Present

Remember weedkiller and environmental nightmare, Roundup? EPA continues to argue that it does not cause cancer - dismissing concerns from independent scientists and mounting evidence suggesting otherwise. 

  • facebook
  • twitter
  • google-plus
  • envelope

We all need safe food and clean water.

Donate
Monsanto Roundup
By Amanda Claire Starbuck
12.20.17

EPA’s release of its revised assessment of the cancer-causing potential of glyphosate (the main ingredient in the weedkiller Roundup), is just what we’d imagine Monsanto, and the rest of the agribusiness giants, would’ve asked for this holiday season.

To the surprise of no one, this year’s assessment remains relatively unchanged from last year’s, finding that glyphosate is “not likely to be carcinogenic to humans.”

Despite suggestions from the agency’s divided panel of independent scientists and countless public pleas to reject industry studies, EPA appears as determined as ever to produce a cancer assessment that favors the pesticide industry's bottom line over public health.

Under federal regulations, EPA must reregister pesticides every 15 years, a process that includes a cancer risk assessment. EPA published a draft cancer assessment for glyphosate in September 2016 that gave glyphosate the lowest possible cancer rating. 

In November 2016, EPA convened its Scientific Advisory Panel (SAP), where a group of independent scientists reviewed the assessment and heard comments from the public and from industry representatives. I testified on behalf of Food & Water Watch, expressing concern over EPA’s overreliance on industry studies and downplaying of positive findings of carcinogenicity.

The SAP was split on its support of EPA’s cancer findings, with some panelists suggesting that EPA upgrade its cancer classification to “suggestive evidence of carcinogenic potential.” Others criticized the agency’s non-transparent method for selecting studies and inconsistent interpretation of animal studies. In fact, the Panel concluded that EPA did not follow its own Guidelines for Carcinogenic Risk Assessment.

Nevertheless, EPA’s updated draft assessment incorporated few revisions. The agency stands behind its bizarre and inconsistent methods for selecting studies and interpreting data. EPA goes so far as to say that its own risk assessment guidelines “are intended as guidance only” as a way to circumvent criticism over its methods. In the end, the agency retains its original finding that glyphosate is “not likely to be carcinogenic to humans.”

A lot has changed in the 15 months since EPA released its draft assessment that should have caused the agency to be more critical in its revised assessment. 

  1. A series of damning emails were uncovered last spring, documenting how Monsanto worked with the former EPA official in charge of glyphosate’s cancer assessment to support a cancer finding favorable to industry. The same official reportedly “killed” a cancer review planned by another federal agency. 
     
  2. Additional emails between Monsanto employees detail the company’s strategy to twist science in their favor, including ghostwriting scientific papers and paying scientists to sign on as authors. EPA relied heavily on work by three of these authors in its earlier draft assessment, and kept them in the revised assessment despite mounting evidence that the authors’ conflicts of interest should have disqualified them.
     
  3. Over a quarter of a million individuals commented on EPA’s initial draft assessment, including tens of thousands sent by Food & Water Watch supporters urging EPA to ban Roundup until it completes an unbiased assessment. 

EPA will open another comment period on the revised assessment in 2018. Let’s hope the agency will finally listen to its Scientific Advisory Panel and the public by producing a transparent, scientifically-rigorous assessment of the most widely used pesticide in the world.

Related Links

  • Unsealed Documents Reveal Monsanto’s Attempts to Steer EPA Science on Roundup
  • Bayer-Monsanto: Two Wrongs Don’t Make a Right
Printer-friendly versionPrinter-friendly version

Monsanto's Roundup is a "probable human carcinogen." We need to ban it!

Get the latest on your food and water with news, research and urgent actions.

Please leave this field empty

Latest News

  • Trump’s Out, Biden’s In! Now The Fight Of Our Lives On Climate Begins.

    Trump’s Out, Biden’s In! Now The Fight Of Our Lives On Climate Begins.

  • Biden’s 100-Day Must-Do List for a Cleaner, Healthier Country

    Biden’s 100-Day Must-Do List for a Cleaner, Healthier Country

  • Fracking, Federal Lands, And Follow-Through: Will President Biden Do What He Promised?

    Fracking, Federal Lands, And Follow-Through: Will President Biden Do What He Promised?

See More News & Opinions

For Media: See our latest press releases and statements

Food & Water Insights

Looking for more insights and our latest research?

Visit our policy & research library
  • Eversource’s Plan to Privatize New Hartford’s Water

  • The Urgent Case for a Moratorium on Mega-Dairies in New Mexico

  • Fracking, Power Plants and Exports: Three Steps for Meaningful Climate Action

Fracking activist with stickersFracking activist in hatLegal team loves family farmsFood & Water Watch organizer protecting your food

Work locally, make a difference.

Get active in your community.

Food & Water Impact

  • Victories
  • Stories
  • Facts
  • Trump, Here's a Better Use for $25 Billion

  • Here's How We're Going to Build the Clean Energy Revolution

  • How a California Activist Learned to Think Locally

Keep drinking water safe and affordable for everyone.

Take Action
food & water watch logo
en Español

Food & Water Watch mobilizes regular people to build political power to move bold & uncompromised solutions to the most pressing food, water, and climate problems of our time. We work to protect people’s health, communities, and democracy from the growing destructive power of the most powerful economic interests.

Food & Water Watch is a 501(c)3 non-profit organization.

Food & Water Action is a 501(c)4 organization.

Food & Water Watch Headquarters

1616 P Street, NW,
Washington, DC 20036

Main: 202.683.2500

Contact your regional office.

Work with us: See all job openings

  • Problems
    • Broken Democracy
    • Climate Change & Environment
    • Corporate Control of Food
    • Corporate Control of Water
    • Factory Farming & Food Safety
    • Fracking
    • GMOs
    • Global Trade
    • Pollution Trading
  • Solutions
    • Advocate Fair Policies
    • Legal Action
    • Organizing for Change
    • Research & Policy Analysis
  • Our Impact
    • Facts
    • Stories
    • Victories
  • Take Action
    • Get Active Where You Live
    • Organizing Tools
    • Find an Event
    • Volunteer with Us
    • Live Healthy
    • Donate
  • Give
    • Give Now
    • Give Monthly
    • Give a Gift Membership
    • Membership Options
    • Fundraise
    • Workplace Giving
    • Planned Giving
    • Other Ways to Give
  • About
  • News
  • Research Library
  • Contact
  • Careers
  • Donate
Learn more about Food & Water Action www.foodandwateraction.org.
  • facebook
  • twitter
  • 2021 © Food & Water Watch
  • www.foodandwaterwatch.org
  • Terms of Service
  • Data Usage Policy