Official stance suggests keeping options wide open

So you could say the time is right for a bit of a ‘roundup’ on where we in Scotland actually stand with the product.

It’s probably entirely unnecessary to state that, as the world’s most widely used herbicide, glyphosate has been dogged by controversy, court cases, and calls for a ban on its use for years, if not decades.

What was effectively a four-year investigation into the product - which the EU undertook when glyphosate was granted an interim extension to its registration back in 2018 - concluded that most of the scientific evidence available on the product pointed to the fact that it meets the criteria required to classify it as safe to use.

And, when it was published in July, the European Food Safety Authority found no critical areas of concern in its peer review of the risk assessment of the herbicide,. That echoed the results of an 11,000-page investigation in 2021, conducted by scientific experts in four nations, appointed by the European Commission.

However, despite the overwhelming scientific evidence presented, much politicking meant that the EU was still unable to reach a sound majority on whether to back the product or not – and you could say that it was ultimately granted its new ten year re-licensing on a technicality, basically because there were insufficient votes to see the product banned.

But back on home turf, it’s not all plain-sailing as far as trying to convince our own post-Brexit pesticide regulatory body – which seems to be a bit of a joint effort between the Health and Safety Executive and DEFRA – just to do a ‘cut-and-paste’ job when it carries out its own evaluation.

For a start, our authorities are running behind those in the EU after the Government realised that it had to pretty much set up an entirely new national regulatory body from scratch after Brexit. And as I understand it, this meant that a blanket three-year extension was granted to products previously licensed under the EU regulations, a move which meant that as far as we in Great Britain are concerned, the current expiry date for the glyphosate licence is December 2025.

Now as farming organisations settle down to draw up their lobbying tactics to counter home-grown opposition to the use of the chemical, the biggest snag probably lies in the fact that amongst a number of new restrictions introduced by the European Commission on the use of the product, a ban has been placed on its use as a desiccant: “in particular with the intention to control the time point of harvest or to optimise the threshing”.

And while that might account for a negligible proportion of the use of the product in the hotter, drier, and more arid areas of the continent, in Scotland’s cool, wet, maritime climate such a use often has a crucial role to play, especially in wetter harvest.

So right from the get-go, our lobbying efforts will really need to be ramped up to ensure that we can hold on to this important use of glyphosate in the future.

(To be fair there might be a bit of a get-out clause due to the fact that the EU will continue to allow the pre-harvest use for the control of weeds in the crop - and I’m guessing that control of weeds such as couch could be included here.)

But on the broader front, I met with a bit of a cagey response when I contacted both HSE and DEFRA to get chapter and verse on the licensing situation in the UK. I was initially quizzed as to what sort of stance I was taking in my article - and even after they were assured that it was aimed at those who actually use the product, I got little more than what could only be described as a pretty generic response from a less than enthusiastic Defra press office which handled the matter.

I was told:

*Glyphosate is currently approved for use in Great Britain: “We will consider the position when the approval of glyphosate is next due for renewal.”

*In due course, our assessment of the priority to be assigned to the reconsideration of glyphosate will be based on a careful scientific assessment of the evidence and risks of glyphosate at that time.

*We are committed to ensuring pesticides are available in GB only when scientific evidence shows they do not pose unacceptable risks to people and the environment. HSE can undertake a review of an active substance approval at any time if concerns are identified that warrant this.

*This enables us to respond to new scientific developments and evaluations undertaken by other jurisdictions if new information calls the safety of the active substance into question.”

So it certainly looks like the official line is to keep their options wide open at the moment.

On the political front, only a few short weeks ago there were some reassuring noises made by the then Defra Secretary of State Thérèse Coffey who told farmers that we would continue to have access to glyphosate once the UK’s post-Brexit pesticide regulation regime was developed, describing the herbicide as “critical for regenerative farming”.

Speaking at a Westminster reception on Back British Farming Day back in September, Dr Coffey added: “The science is clear. The farmers need it. It is critical to regenerative farming. It is staying.”

She said government policy on glyphosate would be “led by the science”, echoing a central pillar of farming’s campaigning on plant protection and added:

“Since I’ve been in post, we have given an absolute commitment to continuing glyphosate. We’re not going to be put off course by lots of other campaigns.”

But as we all know a fair old bit of water has passed under the bridge – and a fair number of heads have rolled - since then and to date the current incumbent, Steve Barclay has yet to make his views known.

Of course, with a general election looming on the horizon, it’s entirely possible that what could easily become a vote-losing controversial issue could be kicked into touch and left for the next government to decide. And as it looks likely that there’ll be no straightforward shoe-in for any particular party, the field is wide open for anyone wishing to place a bet on who might be at the helm at Westminster then…

Now I haven’t managed to get an official answer, but I believe that given that the regulatory body works on a GB-wide basis, the licence will also be granted at that level. Hopefully, it won’t follow the same ridiculous course which saw the Scottish Government fail to give emergency authorisation to the use of asulam earlier in the year. (However, it might have been interesting to see how the SNP would have balanced its desire to remain as closely aligned as possible with the EU on the glyphosate front - while at the same time managing to placate the Green party.)

But even here there is a further complicating factor - as, although the EU has approved the product, it still has to be individually evaluated and authorised in each Member State.

Following the renewal of approval, all national authorisations must be reviewed and in the light of the conditions and restrictions which have been set – and this means that Member States can restrict their use at national or regional level if they consider this necessary based on the outcome of risk assessments, in particular when considering the need to protect biodiversity.

This situation is likely to leave the door open to allowing specific member states to bow to the demands of vocal groups calling for a ban on its use, a fact which could also have implications for the importation of crops grown with its use from other areas.

So, I’m afraid that this is one roundup that, as of yet, can provide no definitive answer.