The European Commission’s proposal for a five-year re-authorisation secured the required qualified majority at a meeting of the European Union’s appeal committee on phytopharmaceuticals in Brussels on Monday.

Countries representing 65% of the EU’s population had to agree for a decision to be made, and the final tally returned 65.71% in favour.

The Commission had referred its proposal to the appeal committee after representatives of EU member states failed to agree on successive proposals for a 10-year and a five-year license for the active ingredient in Monsanto’s Roundup and other leading weedkillers.

Germany, which had previously abstained, changed its position and supported the proposal. The collapse of coalition talks including the Green party last week left the caretaker government led by Chancellor Angela Merkel free to cast a positive vote.

The UK voted in favour of re-authorising glyphosate.

France and Italy were the most populous countries to vote against the proposal, bringing the result close to the failure mark.

Cancer controversy

Opponents to glyphosate argue that one scientific assessment, that of the International Agency of Research on Cancer of the World Health Organisation, classified the substance as “probably carginogenic”.

Most farming organisations point out that all food safety agencies in the EU, as well as the US and New Zealand, have concluded that glyphosate does not cancer. They estimate that banning glyphosate would significantly reduce crop production in Europe and reverse efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from tillage farming through reduced tilling practices.

Reaction

Speaking after the vote on Monday, NFUS president Andrew McCornick said that glyphosate’s re-authorisation process has been unecessarily protracted but welcomes the fact that farmers now know they can use the herbicide next year.

“Off the back of such a difficult harvest and challenging planting conditions for so many Scottish farmers, the thought of not having such a useful and environmentally-beneficial product would have been daunting,” McCornick said. “Glyphosate is vital to Scottish farmers who use it to control weeds, manage harvests, and reduce grain drying costs.”