Renewal of approval of glyphosate in 2022 : The Assessment Group on Glyphosate releases its draft assessment

16 June 2021

In May 2019, the European Commission appointed France, Hungary, The Netherlands and Sweden to act as rapporteur Member States for the next assessment on glyphosate. 

Glyphosate is a chemical widely-used in Plant Protection Products (PPPs) to act as a broad-spectrum herbicide.

Given the known toxicity of such chemicals, the EU Pesticides Legislation imposes the issuing of time-limited authorizations, while concomitantly requiring a periodic reassessment of the active substances in order for their market licenses to be extended. The current five-year market authorization for glyphosate is set to expire on December 15^th 2022. 

On June 15^th 2021, the Assessment Group on Glyphosate – composed by the Rapporteurs Member States – submitted the draft Renewal Assessment Report on the renewal of glyphosate to the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA). Simultaneously, the AGG has sent the report on harmonised classification and labelling of glyphosate to the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA).

The renewal draft  ends up paving the way for the renewed use of glyphosate, concluding that classification for mutagenicity, reproductive toxicity, specific target organ toxicity and carcinogenicity were not justified in this case. In addition, the report finally states that glyphosate cannot qualify as an endocrine disruptor and includes an application to set a Maximum Reside Level to establish a safe use of the substance in honey.

The draft Renewal Report clearly rely on farmers to safely use the substance based on good agricultural practices, disregarding the well-established scientific evidence that lead glyphosate to be considered a threat for bees and for biodiversity system.