European Researchers Concerned About High Levels of Glyphosate in Foods

Photo: Pexels

Originally Appeared in Presence Marketing News, February 2020
By Steven Hoffman

“The toxic pesticide glyphosate should not be in the food chain,” researcher Thomas Bohn of the Institute of Marine Research in Tromso, Norway, told FoodNavigator in January 2020. His concern, along with that of other researchers in Norway and the U.K., is that glyphosate is the most widely used pesticide in the world due to its use on GMO soybeans, resulting, he says in higher levels of glyphosate residues in plants and food products. According to research published in Foods in late 2019, farmers in Argentina and Brazil from 1996 to 2014 have increased application of glyphosate in their fields “more than twice as high as the recommended doses used in most field trials.” Also, reports FoodNavigator, research has shown that late-season spraying of glyphosate – used as a desiccant and harvest aid in GMO and non-GMO soybeans – increases glyphosate residues in harvested soybeans by a factor of 10 or more. “These factors increase adsorption of the herbicide and augment residue levels in the harvested beans,” the researchers wrote. According to Bohn, the current risk assessment system only received data from field trials with soybeans that were sprayed with “much lower” doses compared to “contemporary commercial farms,” reports FoodNavigator. “All possible measures should be taken to reduce consumption of glyphosate, like avoidance of desiccation, reduced used by farmers, etc. Glyphosate should not be in the food chain,” Bohn told FoodNavigator. According to a CNN report, glyphosate increased the cancer risk of those exposed to it by 41%, according to a peer-reviewed study published in 2019.