Many thanks to Center for Food Safety for
alerting us to another atrocity.
USDA paves the way for planting of two more
pesticide promoting genetically engineered (GE) crops
Center for Food Safety
December 12, 2014
Center for Food Safety criticized the final
Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) released today by the U.S.
Department of Agriculture (USDA) on Monsanto's dicamba-resistant
soybeans and cotton. The EIS paves the way for introduction of new
crops genetically engineered to survive spraying with the herbicide
dicamba. If approved, the anticipated widespread adoption of these GE
crops would lead to an over 10-fold increase in dicamba use in
American agriculture, from under 4 million lbs. at present to more
than 40 million lbs. per year. Commercialization is also
contingent on EPA approval of dicamba formulations for use on the new
crops, which is presently under consideration.
"Monsanto's genetically-engineered dicamba-resistant crops are yet
another example of how pesticide firms are taking agriculture back to
the dark days of heavy, indiscriminate use of hazardous pesticides,
seriously endangering human health and the environment," said Andrew
Kimbrell, executive director of Center for Food Safety. "Should both
agencies approve this application, Center for Food Safety will pursue
all available legal options to halt the introduction of this dangerous
crop."
First approved in the 1967, dicamba is a potent broadleaf herbicide
that in epidemiology studies has been linked to increased rates of
cancer in farmers and birth defects in their male offspring.
Dicamba is moderately persistent and frequently detected in surface
waters. Farmers are particularly concerned by dicamba's
propensity to drift and damage neighboring crops. Dicamba drift
also threatens flowering plants that provide nectar for pollinators
and habitat for other species. The large increase in dicamba
applications that would accompany the crops is expected to
dramatically escalate these adverse impacts.
Monsanto has presented dicamba resistant crops as a quick fix to the
epidemic of glyphosate-resistant weeds generated by massive use of
glyphosate herbicide with the company's first-generation GE crops,
known as Roundup Ready. However, USDA itself and many scientists
predict that the massively increased use of dicamba with these new GE
crops will rapidly foster development of still more intractable weeds
resistant to both dicamba and glyphosate.
"Monsanto's dicamba-resistant crops are the latest fruits of a
pesticide industry strategy to increase sales of their toxic
herbicides," said Bill Freese, Center for Food Safety science policy
analyst. "Genetic engineering is making American agriculture
more chemical-dependent and less sustainable than ever before."
Freese notes that USDA's EIS follows hard on the heels of its
September 2014 approval of GE 2,4-D-resistant corn and soybeans from
Dow Chemical Company, and approvals of similar herbicide-resistant
crops developed by other pesticide companies.
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