By Philip Blenkinsop and Marine Strauss
BRUSSELS (Reuters) -European Union governments failed to give a clear opinion on Friday on a proposal to extend by 10 years EU approval for the use of glyphosate, the active ingredient in Bayer AG’s Roundup weedkiller.
A “qualified majority” of 15 countries representing at least 65% of the bloc’s population had been required either to support or to block the proposal.
In the absence of such a majority either way, EU governments will try again in the first half of November when another failure to produce a clear opinion would leave the decision with the European Commission.
The previous time glyphosate’s licence came up for re-approval, the EU gave it a five-year extension after EU countries twice failed to support a 10-year period.
The World Health Organization’s cancer research agency concluded in 2015 that glyphosate was probably carcinogenic to humans, but other agencies around the world, including the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the European Chemicals Agency, have classified glyphosate as non-carcinogenic.
Bayer has said decades of studies have shown it is safe and the chemical has been widely used by farmers, or to clear weeds from railway lines for decades, but EU approval was set to expire at the end of the year.
Campaign group Pesticides Action Network says that there are serious question marks about the safety assessments and that the majority of citizens polled in six EU countries believe glyphosate should be banned.
(Reporting by Philip Blenkinsop, Marine Strauss; editing by Christina Fincher and Sharon Singleton)
