Glyphosate has been described as a “toxicity multiplier” because its impact on health can increase when it binds to other chemicals. About four years ago, a survey of products used on crops in Malta by the National Statistics Office showed that half of all glyphosate imported for agriculture was applied by potato farmers. The rest was used in fields where vines, vegetables and fruit were grown.
The European Union, which under its regulatory system must assess all agrichemicals for safety to humans, animals and the environment every 10 years, first gave permission for the use of glyphosate in Europe in 2002.The herbicide can be freely bought from any local garden centre in Malta.
But glyphosate has been linked to kidney failure and a range of other health problems. The international agency for cancer research under the World Health Organisation highlighted glyphosate as a probable cause of cancer some two years ago. Tests on animals have shown links to cancer and that it may be carcinogenic in humans. Pressure to ban glyphosate has been on the increase since 2013.
Against this worrying background, the Ministry for the Environment announced last summer that it had started the process to ban glyphosate. But it has now transpired that only a selective ban was applied, covering just those products which contained both the active substance glyphosate and the co-formulant POE-tallowamine.
The bottom line is that the much-touted ban on glyphosates is nothing of the sort because other products containing the active ingredient glyphosate can still be used.
Why has Malta not banned glyphosate despite the Minister for Environment’s promise to do so? Under the precautionary approach to risk management, “if an action or policy shows a suspected risk of causing harm to the public or to the environment, in the absence of scientific consensus that the action or policy is not harmful, the burden of proof that it is not harmful falls on those taking an action that may or may not be at risk”. Better safe than sorry and first do no harm are axioms that capture the meaning of the precautionary principle perfectly.
The application of the precautionary principle has been made a statutory requirement in many areas of European law, including the environment. It is a principle followed by policymakers to justify discretionary decisions in situations, such as glyphosate, where there is a possibility of harm from taking a particular course of action, when there is a social responsibility to protect the public from exposure to harm and when scientific investigation has found a plausible risk. All these factors apply in this case.
A wise government that cared for the health and livelihood of its citizens would have acted to ban its use. Instead, the Malta Competition and Consumers Authority has meekly ruled out a ban on the use of glyphosate in Malta unless and until the EU imposes it or introduces new procedures for controlling its use.
The minister says he can only ban glyphosate once he is permitted to do so by the EU. Yet, he personally had concluded some months ago that it was in Malta’s best interests that it should be banned locally.
This is the kind of issue which gives the EU a bad name. The minister should be returning to the charge with the EU and demanding that, in the light of the EU’s own laws embracing the precautionary principle and the serious concerns about glyphosate’s carcinogenic properties, it should be banned with immediate effect.