Dicamba – The Herbicide Monsanto is Promoting to Replace Roundup’s Glyphosate

Dicamba is the active ingredient, or is one of a few active ingredients, in herbicidal products the same way glyphosate is the active ingredient in Roundup. It’s been commonly used for over seventy years in professional landscaping as well as home gardening, and its recent popularity is on the rise thanks to the public gaining knowledge regarding the harmful effects of Monsanto’s Roundup. Monsanto has reintroduced Dicamba as the herbicide for the “next-generation.”

The product is causing damage when it drifts onto other fields, and many state agriculture authorities have either banned the substance or are considering such bans. Dicamba lawsuits from commercial farmers are becoming more frequent as well.

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What is Dicamba?

First developed in England during the Second World War, dicamba is a broad-spectrum herbicide found in several brands of commercial weed killer, including Ortho Weed B Gon, Ace Lawn Weed Killer and Roundup Max. Chemically, it’s part of a group known as the chlorophenoxy family. More specifically, it is an organochloride, a carbon-based compound, the molecules of which contain atoms of the element chlorine. It is derived from benzoic acid, a substance occurring naturally in several plant species and commonly used as a food preservative.” – Dicamba Drift Lawsuit Lawyer – Crop Damage Compensation

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For a toxin, Dicamba may be safer to humans than glyphosate. It seems we pass it through our urine, and studies indicate that residues do not bioaccumulate in biological systems. To say a product is “safer,” compared to glyphosate, certainly does not indicate that the product is safe, and no long term studies have been done on the health effects of Dicamba. It’s clearly not good for the environment, and it doesn’t belong in our food supply.

Almost exactly a year ago, on Oct. 27, 2016, farm worker Allan Curtis Jones allegedly shot and killed soybean farmer Mike Wallace on a county road in Arkansas. The sheriff later told reporters that the two men had been arguing. Their dispute, the sheriff said, apparently revolved around a phenomenon known in the region as ‘dicamba drift.’ – NBC News

Related: PCBs, Roundup, and Dicamba – Monsanto’s Current Problems

In the heartland states, NBC reports that farmers are pitted against each other. Farmers not using the product report the chemical has wafted onto their fields and damaged their crops which are not genetically modified to withstand Dicamba.

Jones has pleaded not guilty to a first-degree murder charge. He is slated to go to trial in December.

According to the state’s farm bureau website, Arkansas ranks third in domestic cotton production, accounting for approximately 7 percent of the national crop. The state comes in at 10 in soybean production, and about half of that is exported.

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Dicamba Lawsuit Against Monsanto, BASF, and DuPont Filed as Farmers Deal With Drift

There have been rumblings from farmers dealing with the damage caused by herbicide dicamba for quite some time now, and (legal) shots have now been fired. On Monday, a complaint against Monsanto, BASF, and DuPont was filed in Southern Illinois on behalf of Brian Warren, owner of Warren Farms in Broughton, IL. Filed by an attorney from Classaction.com, Rene Rocha, the lawsuit alleges that dicamba was deceptively marketed as “low-volatility”, a claim that the 2,242 farmers currently dealing with crops ruined by the herbicide would dispute.

Related: Monsanto’s Glyphosate, Fatty Liver Disease Link Proven – Published, Peer-reviewed, Scrutinized Study

Dicamba has been touted as a replacement for glyphosate, whose effectiveness is dwindling as glyphosate-resistant, “super weeds” like Palmer amaranth become more common. For a new product launch, companies commission their own tests and share them with regulatory agencies. Conversations with scientists responsible for initial safety tests run by Monsanto have revealed that the company specifically did not allow them to test their new version of dicamba for volatility. The Environmental Protection Agency allowed to company to release the herbicide anyway.

Currently, more than 3 million acres of crops have been damaged by dicamba drift. States with substantial acreage devoted to growing soybeans, like Iowa, are experiencing record numbers of complaints from farmers. According to Scott Partridge, Monsanto’s vice-president of global strategy, as much as three-fourths of the problems occurring with dicamba application are caused by operator error. This actually makes sense.  The insert that accompanies XtendiMax seems more suited for a meteorologist, with instructions like “If fog is not present, inversions can also be identified by the movement of smoke from a ground source or an aircraft smoke generator…” and a chart designed to inform farmers of the ideal wind speed to apply the product during (3 and 10 miles an hour).

Related: Understanding and Detoxifying Genetically Modified Foods

Where is the Recourse?

If your neighbors have applied the product incorrectly (and they likely have: check out these instructions!), you don’t have much recourse. Insurance companies are unlikely to find in your favor, and Monsanto has made it clear where they feel the blame lies. In fact, the damage caused by dicamba is likely to be a good thing for Monsanto. Farmers hoping to avoid a repeat of this year’s devastated crops could end up purchasing dicamba-resistant crops.

So we arrive back at the newly filed lawsuit. Farmers like Brian Warren who sue frequently lose, or spend so much money and time in court with biotech companies that a win ends up costing more than the initial loss. At this point, many farmers will have to write off this year’s crops and make a big decision about next year. They can purchase dicamba-resistant seeds and grow the demand for a product that isn’t safe and doesn’t behave as promised or they can potentially lose their livelihood. What kind of choice is that?

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PCBs, Roundup, and Dicamba – Monsanto’s Current Problems

They say bad news comes in threes, and biotech giant Monsanto can certainly attest to the truth of that statement right now. Their newest product line, XtendiMax (better known as dicamba), made it to market without proper volatility testing. This refers to the product’s tendency to vaporize and travel. Subsequently, dicamba is drifting, causing major damage to neighboring crops, and currently banned in one U.S. state. There have also been two separate instances of newly released documents confirming that Monsanto knew two of their products, PCBs (from 1935 and 1977) and glyphosate, are harmful and continued to defend and sell them in spite of that.

For years, Monsanto has presented unsafe products as safe with little to no repercussion. Yet it is still on track to further dominate the food supply due to the company’s merger with Bayer. So why are the agencies charged with regulating food and environmental safety ok with Monsanto’s market control in the face of their shady practices?

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Past Indiscretions with PCBs

PCBs, or polychlorinated biphenyls, were banned pretty much everywhere in 1979 after being linked to cancer and environmental degradation. PCBs began manufacture in 1935, and the first evidence of their toxicity appeared in 1937, after three workers who handled the chemicals died from acute liver damage. Serious health and environmental concerns continue to be reported to this day, even though the largest manufacturer of these, Monsanto, halted their production in 1977.

Monsanto is currently being sued by the state of Washington and eight cities for PCB contamination. Recently released documents have confirmed that Monsanto was aware of the effect of PCBs as early as 1969, eight years before they stopped selling them. A 1969 pollution abatement plan from the company acknowledged the product’s risks, stating “…“The evidence proving the persistence of these compounds and their universal presence in the environment is beyond questioning.” In another letter from a Monsanto manager in 1975, the company knew that “There is a potential real effect to humans – including death…”

In Monsanto’s own words, PCBs are dangerous in more ways than one. Yet they made money and Monsanto is first and foremost a business. But this wouldn’t be the only instance of company records showing corporate profits trump health, safety, and environmental concerns.

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Present Problems with Roundup

More court documents exposing Monsanto’s behind the scenes manipulations were released by attorneys pursuing claims against the company in regards to the link between Roundup and non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. Attorneys from the law firm Baum Hedlund Aristei Goldman released more than 700 pages of internal documents, detailing Monsanto’s behind the scenes activities. Numerous emails, texts, and other documents confirm that employees at Monsanto ghostwrote and manipulated scientific studies and expert panel discussions, failed to disclose conflicts of interest, discredited multiple negative glyphosate studies, and colluded with the Environmental Protection Agency. The International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) labeled glyphosate as probably carcinogenic to humans in 2015, but it’s clear from the recently released documents that Monsanto has known this since before 2008.

These documents also make Monsanto’s strategy for avoiding regulation clear: government collusion. Many of the documents released are communications with high ranking individuals at the Environmental Protection Agency, imploring them to delay scientific reviews of glyphosate multiple times. Monsanto’s has a clear modus operandi once they learn their products cause human harm – muddy the scientific waters, defend it furiously, and make as much money as possible. Their experience with PCBs was a learning experience. The lesson? Get the agencies regulating you to do the dirty work.

Related: Understanding and Detoxifying Genetically Modified Foods

Future Uncertainty with Dicamba

The Environmental Protection Agency approved Monsanto’s newest version of dicamba, XtendiMax, in November of 2016. Poised to replace glyphosate now that many weeds are developing resistance to that product, many farmers instead experienced serious crop loss after illegal versions of it used prior to that release drifted onto their fields from neighboring farms. With the product officially released, Monsanto is now facing a class actions lawsuits from farmers reporting severe losses for the second year in a row.

Testimony from researchers, regulators, and a company employee indicate that Monsanto used its influence to bring the product to market without all of the proper tests, including a proper volatility test. In fact, testing contracts for the product explicitly forbade it. Yet the EPA approved the product without it.

Arkansas was the only state to ask for additional testing. Monsanto denied that request. Arkansas has now banned dicamba, and other states are now assessing damage from the herbicide for the second year in a row. This damage occurs when dicamba drifted to other, non-modified crops, the exact scenario further testing could have predicted. A class action lawsuit is pending.

Is It Too Late?

Monsanto wields incredible influence with government agencies, scientists, and researchers. This allows the company to continually deny and create confusion around health and environmental damages that their products are actually causing. And it’s scary. What chance do we have when those charged with upholding regulations created to protect the public are on the Monsanto Christmas card list?

It took nearly a decade from when Monsanto privately acknowledged the damage PCBs were causing for regulatory agencies to do something about it. The new formulation of dicamba, XtendiMax, has been on the market for less than a year and has been banned in both Arkansas and Missouri. The times are changing.

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USDA Drops Glyphosate Testing Plans, Makes Monsanto’s Life Easier

The U.S. Department of Agriculture is no longer planning to test samples of corn syrup for glyphosate residue. Plans to test for the herbicide were coordinated between the USDA and the Environmental Protection Agency and scheduled to begin in April of this year.

The cancellation of this program is good news for Monsanto. The company is currently embroiled in litigation, with plaintiffs in the case alleging that Roundup caused non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. The extent of the EPA’s involvement in the lawsuit is not known, although the federal judge presiding over the case has indicated he is likely to subpoena the chair of the EPA’s Cancer Assessment Review Committee. Regardless of the lawsuit, the decision by the USDA to drop scheduled glyphosate testing is disheartening and further erodes their food integrity credibility.

Agencies in Disarray

The USDA’s failure to properly test for glyphosate residue is baffling. The agency’s reasons for not testing for the world’s most used pesticide center around that process being too expensive and inefficient. If that argument sounds familiar, that’s because it echoes Monsanto’s own thoughts on glyphosate tests. The Food and Drug Administration doesn’t necessarily agree. Last year they set in motion a testing program that found glyphosate in every sample of honey tested. Launched in February, it was indefinitely suspended by November.

When Demand Isn’t Enough

Europe and Canada have glyphosate testing programs in place, with the Canadian Food Inspection Agency planning to release their findings in the near future. This is the most used herbicide in the world, with over 250 million pounds of it used in the U.S. every year. Any layperson looking for it has only to walk into the nearest supermarket, restaurant, or convenience store. But we don’t know for sure, although we definitely want to.

The entire motivation behind the FDA’s short-lived was public demand. The American public and the U.S Government Accountability Office both have issues with the current ill-advised and unsustainable system. For a brief, shining period the USDA got it. The taxpayer need and demand for testing didn’t change. So what did?

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Lawsuit Alleges that Monsanto Influenced the EPA’s Classification of Glyphosate

In 2015, the World Health Organization categorized glyphosate as a probable human carcinogen. A new lawsuit, filed on behalf of cancer victims, claims the Environmental Protection Agency had the information to label glyphosate as carcinogenic two years earlier and instead chose to claim glyphosate was “not likely to be carcinogenic to humans.”

Marion Copley, now deceased, was a toxicologist at the EPA for 30 years. In 2013, she wrote a letter to Jess Rowland, the chair of the EPA’s Cancer Assessment Review Committee (CARC), listing 14 reasons to classify glyphosate as carcinogenic. Copley also alleged that Rowland and other select colleagues changed important reports to benefit companies like Monsanto.

The lawsuit is demanding the release of Jess Rowland’s communications with Monsanto during his time on the CARC and his involvement with the release of the EPA’s memo declaring glyphosate is “not likely to be carcinogenic to humans.”

Something Isn’t Adding Up

This is not the first time there have been questions surrounding the EPA and their treatment of glyphosate. A glyphosate risk report that found glyphosate was not likely to be carcinogenic to humans, a direct contrast to the WHO report, was released in 2016 on the EPA website on April 29, only to be taken down four days later. This is not the first time two different groups of scientists (the IARC and CARC) have taken a look at the same problem and come up with conflicting views. But the EPA sent officials to help conduct the IARC study. The discrepancy in results was enough for the House of Representatives Science Committee to request interviews with four different EPA officials, including Jess Rowland. While it makes sense for the chair of the CARC to be mentioned, the letter from Marion Copley makes the EPA’s findings seem more like a dictate from private interests than an independent government report.

Where is Monsanto in All of This?

It goes without saying that Monsanto is deeply invested in keeping glyphosate from being labeled as a health hazard. It’s easy to sound like a conspiracy theorist, accusing the EPA of being in Monsanto’s back pocket, that EPA scientists collaborated with the scientists who found that glyphosate was a probable carcinogen and then walked it back. Monsanto is now using the EPA’s official report to dispute the study that the found that glyphosate was harmful. In that light, Marion Copley’s allegations of changing study findings to favor industry are not so outlandish. Until we have a transparent system, we have to trust that government science has our best interests at heart. Do we matter more than Monsanto?

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Monsanto’s Glyphosate, Fatty Liver Disease Link Proven – Published, Peer-reviewed, Scrutinized Study

Glyphosate. The world’s most popular herbicide. An alleged cause of cancer. Available in supermarkets across the nation, whether you want it or not. So what is the latest accomplishment for Monsanto’s golden child? Fatty liver disease!

Dr. Michael Antoniou from King’s College in London has found a link between the herbicide and non-alcoholic fatty liver disease, a condition whose symptoms include fatigue, nausea, jaundice, cirrhosis, and abdominal pain, among others. It is found primarily in overweight and obese people, people with diabetes, and those with high cholesterol. According to Dr. Robin Mesnage, another author of the study,

The concentration of glyphosate that was added to the drinking water of the rats corresponds to a concentration found in tap water for human consumption. It is also lower than the contamination of some foodstuffs.”

Where is the Science?

Glyphosate has been on the market since 1974 and since the advent of genetically-modified, Roundup ready crops in 1996, more than 18 billion tons of the stuff has been used worldwide (nearly a fifth of that was in the U.S. alone). It’s been linked to environmental degradation, and the number of studies linking glyphosate to health issues are growing. The work from King’s College is the first to definitively identify a real risk glyphosate poses to human health. Dr. Antoniou says,

The findings of our study are very worrying as they demonstrate for the first time a causative link between an environmentally relevant level of Roundup consumption over the long-term and a serious disease.”

Long-term studies on the impact of glyphosate are few and subject to huge amounts of scrutiny. A previous two-year study, the Seralini study in 2012, tested rats for long-term toxicity and found that the rats developed tumors and had shorter life spans. The study was heavily criticized, and the publisher retracted it in 2013 despite protests from the authors.

The recently discovered link between glyphosate and fatty liver disease is peer-reviewed, scrutinized, published in Scientific Reports, and from a prestigious university. But it has only now been released. One of the authors on the paper is Gilles-Eric Seralini (he of the previously retracted study), and this study uses the same, roundly criticized breed of rat from the previous study. The Crop Protection Association has already called the validity of this study into question saying, “Glyphosate is amongst the most thoroughly tested herbicides on the market, and those studies by expert regulators have consistently concluded that glyphosate does not pose a risk to public health.”

Americans Enjoy a More Substantial Glyphosate Allowance

The Crop Protection Association is correct. Glyphosate is one of the most tested herbicides on the market (although generally for 90 days, not 730). From this testing, the government has decided that there is a safe amount of glyphosate that can be ingested. That amount, the allowable daily intake (ADI), is 1.75 mg per kg of body weight in the United States. In Europe, the ADI is much lower at 0.3 mg per kg of bodyweight. Immediately, this discrepancy calls to mind a certain stereotype, that of the overweight American tourist bobbing merrily through a sea of slim and sneering Europeans. With the link between non-alcoholic fatty liver disease and glyphosate, is it too much of a leap to think that the rise of obesity in America could be caused by our lax attitude towards the omnipresent herbicide?

What is Non-Alcoholic Liver Disease?

Basically, fat accumulates in the liver when the liver cannot break it down or process it fast enough. The liver normally stores some fat, but when the liver builds up more than 5 – 10 percent of its weight in fat, it’s called fatty liver disease. In alcoholic fatty liver disease, the liver can break down if it is unable to process the amount of alcohol ingested. Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease follows the same model, only without the alcohol. This problem, like so many health problems, starts in the gut.

Bacteria in the large and small intestine like Lactobacillus and Bifidobacterium are responsible for breaking down fats in the body. The liver helps with this, sending bile into the small intestine to help with turning the food into smaller molecules. But a digestive system without enough beneficial bacteria to properly digest food is left with something closer to the original fat molecules. Unabsorbed fats should stay in the intestine, but the bile from the liver is responsible for cleaning the intestine. Almost all of that bile is recycled back to the liver, potentially carrying the less digested fats with it. From there, the liver can be overwhelmed by the accumulated fats that it can’t clear out, much like its response to alcohol in alcoholic fatty liver disease.

And the Glyphosate Is…?

Much of the blame for non-alcoholic liver disease can be placed squarely on the diet of those who have it. Processed sugars and refined foods feed opportunistic, less helpful microbes in the gut like Candida, that in turn crowd out beneficial bacteria and place more stress on the liver. It’s all about the processed foods – the foods likely to have the highest concentration of glyphosate. And the glyphosate is everywhere.

The Detox Project at the University of California San Francisco found glyphosate in 93% of the urine samples from their early tests. This is the glyphosate that was processed out of the body. Meanwhile, the poor liver chugs along like some cliche of an overworked housewife, left with the overload of improperly digested food molecules, toxic food additives, and who knows exactly how much herbicide piled on top of it.

Research Matters. So Where’s the Rest of It?

Lack of research is the biggest issue with current government attitudes towards glyphosate and why this study matters. The authors of this study saw the connection between non-alcoholic fatty liver disease and glyphosate with a regular dose 75,000 times below the European limit and over 400,000 times below the U.S. limit. There is no way to measure how much glyphosate people are being exposed to through proximity to agriculture, their food, and even their tap water. Glyphosate is everywhere, and we barely even know the results of long-term, repeated exposure to it.

Imagine a study, much in the vein of this one, where scientists gave test subjects the full U.S. government allowable daily intake of glyphosate regularly for two years. Do you even want to see those results?

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EU Proposal to Renew Glyphosate License Blocked!

Europe has become a battleground between environmental groups and big biotech companies. A French farmer won a case against Monsanto after suffering neurological problems due to inhaling their weedkiller, Lasso. By now, everyone has seen the study from the World Health Organization’s cancer agency calling glyphosate, the darling of Monsanto’s herbicides, probably carcinogenic. Instances like these and many others have left some European Nations wary of these chemicals, as evidence of their toxicity to humans is on the rise.

The Votes Are…Not In

And now we come to a crossroads. The European license for glyphosate is scheduled to expire on June 30. Previous meetings of nations of the European Union to renew the license for a 15-year span have ended in stalemates, as countries have refused to support that renewal in the face of growing scientific unrest and public opposition. The latest meeting took place Monday, with the executive body of the European Union, the European Commission (which is not affiliated with any specific country), proposing a 12- to 18-month extension for more scientific study. Malta was the only voice speaking against the extension, but the lack of votes from Germany, France, Italy, Greece, Austria, Portugal and Luxembourg kept the extension from being adopted.

The Results Are…Likely To Go One of Two Ways

So what happens now, with the glyphosate license expiring in less than a month? Option one would be an executive decision by the European Commission ignoring the lack of agreement from EU Nations and reauthorizing glyphosate. While possible, this scenario flies in the face of the Commission’s support of the democratic process that led to last year’s law allowing countries to make their own decisions regarding genetically modified crops. The leader of the Commission, Jean-Claude Juncker, has publicly proclaimed his unwillingness to act against the interests of the majority view. The proposal of an extension did receive support from many countries, though, and Monsanto could see losses of potentially up to $5 billion dollars, which could result in some serious corporate pressure on the Commission.

What’s behind door number two? The simple option: leave it be. If a new agreement is not in place by the 30th of June, the license  is expired and all glyphosate products need to be gone from European Union shelves in six months. Is this more likely to happen if there are only eight votes either blocking or missing in keeping glyphosate from the shiny new license it desires? It seems unlikely until you consider some of the countries that abstained: Germany, France, and Italy, aka, three of the most powerful countries in the EU. The more you look at it, the more prudent this option becomes, really. Glyphosate has been labeled as probably cancer-causing. A product with issues (dangerous malfunctions, allergens or food contamination) would be pulled the shelves immediately. Why is glyphosate any different?

The Whole World Should be Watching

Europe has been on the forefront of recent biotech regulations in agriculture, and the decision, in this case, will resonate throughout the world. Supporters of a renewed license have pointed to the fear and confusion this will cause with consumers, which consumers would be well within their rights to feel. A probable cancer-causing chemical that has previously been sprayed with wild abandon is pulled off of shelves until a scientific consensus can be reached. What exactly is there to fear again? The knowledge that safety takes a backseat to profits, perhaps.

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