Prop 65 requires the state to publish a list of chemicals that may cause cancer
By Diego Flammini
News Reporter
Farms.com
Monsanto is taking legal action against the State of California for its decision to list glyphosate as a possible carcinogen.
The RoundUp manufacturer filed a lawsuit against California in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of California on Wednesday to reject glyphosate’s place on Proposition 65.
On July 7 of this year, the Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment (OEHHA) added glyphosate to Proposition 65 (Prop 65), which requires the state to publish a list of chemicals that may cause cancer.
As a result, any products containing even trace amounts of glyphosate must have a warning label that the product could cause cancer.
The Prop 65 listing comes after a 2015 report from the International Agency for Research on Cancer concluded glyphosate is a possible carcinogen.
But on Nov. 9 the Journal of the National Cancer Institute published that there are no links between glyphosate and cancer.
And Monsanto maintains its stance that glyphosate is a sound and necessary tool for America’s farmers.
“Glyphosate is a safe, environmentally sustainable and cost-effective tool for farmers,” Scott Partridge, vice president of global strategy for Monsanto, said in a statement on Wednesday. “This labeling requirement would do nothing more than compel false warnings about a safe product and unnecessarily increase food prices for consumers.”
Other ag groups are joining Monsanto in the fight to have glyphosate removed from Prop 65.
Several organizations, including the Missouri Farm Bureau, Iowa Soybean Association and United States Durum Growers Association, are listed as plaintiffs in the lawsuit, according to the Des Moines Register.
Not only would the label requirement have a negative impact on agriculture, it’s also unconstitutional, according to Kirk Leeds, CEO of the Iowa Soybean Association.
“This could be a devastating blow to Iowa soybean farmers and an industry valued at more than $5 billion,” he said in a Wednesday release.
“The unreasonable listing by the OEHAA of glyphosate as a carcinogen as compelled by Prop 65 violates the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution because it compels the plaintiffs in the case to make false, misleading and highly controversial statements about their products.”