EU Commission and scientific agencies systematically excluded critical scientific studies reporting adverse effects caused by glyphosate – PAN Europe

On 11 December, Pesticide Action Network (PAN) Europe and its members ClientEarth, Générations Futures, GLOBAL 2000, Pesticide Action Network Germany and Pesticide Action Network Netherlands challenged the European Union’s approval of glyphosate before the European Court of Justice.

According to PAN Europe, the organisations presented a robust scientific and legal analysis to the European Court of Justice, highlighting serious shortcomings in the assessment of glyphosate in Europe.

PAN Europe said, "The Commission and EU’s scientific agencies[1] either systematically excluded critical scientific studies reporting adverse effects caused by glyphosate, using scientifically unsound arguments, or downplayed these effects by applying, for example, less sensitive and inappropriate statistical methodologies. In doing so, they violated their own guidelines and international protocols. Their conclusion that glyphosate is safe is scientifically unfounded and results from a risk assessment that does not comply with key legal requirements. Therefore, the NGOs are requesting the Court’s intervention.

"The popular herbicide has been linked to serious health and environmental risks, including cancer, reproductive disorders and neurological diseases. Being re-approved for 10 years, it will continue to be used extensively across Europe. European citizens, including children, remain widely exposed to this substance."

In January 2024, the NGOs requested the Commission to review its decision to re-approve glyphosate until 2033, as it fails to comply with the provisions of the EU law and particularly Regulation (EC) 1107/2009.[2] The legislation gives priority to the protection of human health and the environment over placing pesticides products on the market, as previously highlighted by the EU court.[3]

In response, the Commission formally rejected the request for review in September 2024.[3] Now the NGOs are officially filing a challenge in Court.

“The EU scientific agencies are bending the rules to conclude that glyphosate is safe. Numerous scientific studies, including from the industry itself, clearly link it to serious adverse effects, such as cancer and potentially neurological diseases,” said Angeliki Lysimachou, head of science and policy at PAN Europe.

“By intentionally using less sensitive statistical methods, dismissing critical scientific evidence, and overlooking groundbreaking cancer research, the EU is failing in its duty to protect public health. We cannot stay silent on this issue - it is a matter of safeguarding the health of current and future generations.”

The NGOs focused on what they identified as the most significant failings in the EU’s risk assessment of glyphosate. Their analysis reveals an incomplete evaluation of the representative formulation used in European fields, lacking long-term toxicity, carcinogenicity, and cumulative effects. They also recounted the dismissal of peer-reviewed evidence in favour of industry-funded studies downplaying evidence on genotoxicity, neurotoxicity and environmental impacts. Furthermore, the NGOs said the EU assessment is disregarding glyphosate’s impacts on biodiversity and the microbiome and the related health implications. They said these findings together demonstrate the clear violation of the precautionary principle by approving glyphosate despite significant uncertainties and knowledge gaps.[5]

Antoine Bailleux, the NGOs coalition’s lawyer, commented: “It is legitimate for the Commission to enjoy some leeway when managing risks related to the approval of active substances used in pesticides. However, there are limits to such a discretionary power. It is well established case law that the risk assessment must, for instance, comply with the principles of excellence, transparency and independence. We believe that the evaluation of glyphosate has not lived up to these quality standards. This is why we are going to Court.”

Within their analysis of the EU risk assessment of glyphosate, the organisations brought to the Court the following findings:

* Concerns raised by neurotoxicity experts have been ignored. Letters obtained by PAN Europe through an access-to-documents request reveal that scientists had warned the European Commission, European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) and European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) of glyphosate’s potential links to Parkinson’s disease and developmental neurotoxicity - relevant for autism, and cognitive deficiencies in children. The letters criticise EU authorities for failing to disprove these risks.

* The Commission and the European Chemicals Agency in their reply, rely heavily on the cancer analysis by Kenny Crump, a private consultant with a history of defending industries linked to lead, asbestos, and benzene. Crump dismisses all glyphosate-induced tumours as “false positives”, trying to undermine the credibility of the assessment by other scientists, including those from the WHO International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC).

* Statistical manipulation: It is often said that the devil is in the detail. This could not be more true in the case of glyphosate. EU risk assessors employed statistical tests in glyphosate cancer studies designed to examine potential therapeutic effects, lowering the power of the test. Professor of Environmental Biology Geert de Snoo (Leiden University, research director at the Royal Dutch Academy of Science and former member of the Dutch pesticide authority Ctgb) recently called this “bad science” and “poor statistics”. EU risk assessors also chose an approach that is not designed to examine dose-response increases in tumours in glyphosate-exposed animals, further skewing results in favour of glyphosate.

* IARC, in its recommendations for priorities for 2025–2029, reviewed the recent scientific literature on glyphosate and cancer and concluded that the “existing evidence does not appear to support a change in classification”. As a result, the classification as 'probably carcinogenic to humans' remains, while the ECHA refused this classification, building its decision on what can be described as manipulated data.

Background

Glyphosate has been a source of controversy since the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) classified it as “probably carcinogenic to humans” in 2015. Under EU law, pesticides with this hazard classification should be banned from use. However, the EU’s 2017 and 2023 risk assessments concluded that glyphosate poses no significant health risks, allowing it to remain one of the most widely used herbicides in Europe and worldwide.

This discrepancy drove several experts and scientists to investigate the toxicity of glyphosate and the assessment carried by the EU agencies and IARC. The shortcomings of the assessment have been exposed on several occasions.

This legal challenge follows growing public and scientific criticism of the EU’s risk assessment process. In 2023, the Commission renewed glyphosate’s approval for 10 years despite widespread concerns and a failure to meet the high standards required by EU law on pesticides. After receiving an unsatisfactory response to their internal review request in September 2024, the coalition of six NGOs decided to escalate their fight to the European Court of Justice.

Notes

[1] The EU’s assessment procedure for glyphosate relied on the renewal application dossier submitted by an industry consortium. The process involved four “Rapporteur Member States” — national agencies from The Netherlands, Sweden, Hungary, and France — collectively known as the Assessment Group on Glyphosate (AGG); the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA), which evaluated glyphosate’s hazard classification; and the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA), which conducted a peer review of the risk assessment, including the evaluation of a representative formulation used in European fields.

[2] Thanks to a 2021 reform of access to justice laws, NGOs and individuals have the ability to challenge most EU decisions that break environmental law in EU Court. The first step is for NGOs to send the Commission a 'Request for Internal Review". The Commission then has 22 weeks to reply. If the NGOs consider that the Commission’s reply still does not solve the breaches of law, they can challenge the reply before the Court of Justice of the European Union. On January 24, 2024, the consortium of 6 organisations filed a request for internal review to the European Commission on the 10 years approval of glyphosate.

[3] EU Court of Justice, Case C‑162/21 (19 January 2023, consideration 48); “Furthermore, it is clear (….) that the provisions governing authorisations must ensure a high standard of protection and that, in particular, when granting authorisations of plant protection products, the objective of protecting human and animal health and the environment should ‘take priority’ over the objective of improving plant production.”

[4] On June 26, the European Commission rejected the NGOs’ request to cancel the reapproval.

[5] The critical failings of the EU’s risk assessment procedure emphasised by the NGOs in their application to the Court are:

Incomplete risk assessment: Authorities failed to evaluate glyphosate’s long-term toxicity, carcinogenicity, and cumulative effects of the glyphosate “representative” formulation that is used on European fields. This is in contradiction to the European Court of Justice’s 2019 Blaise ruling [Case C-616/17 - analysis]

Dismissal of independent studies: Evidence linking glyphosate to cancer, genotoxicity, neurotoxicity and endocrine disruption from peer-reviewed scientific literature was disregarded or undervalued, in favour of industry-funded studies.

Deviation from scientific standards: Failure to follow internationally accepted protocols, statistical “manipulation” to dismiss cancer-related findings, assumptions about glyphosate’s therapeutic properties, and neglect of biological plausibility.

Dismissal of biodiversity and microbiome impacts: The assessment overlooked glyphosate’s impacts on biodiversity, arguing there is no guidance document. Similarly, it failed to address the well-known impacts of glyphosate on microbiome and its health implications, including impacts on the brain. Two recent EU court rulings clarified that the absence of a guidance does not justify overlooking health impacts [Cases C-308/22; C-309/22 & C310/22 - communication].

Violation of the precautionary principle: By approving glyphosate despite significant uncertainties and knowledge gaps, the Commission violated the precautionary principle, a core pillar of EU environmental policy.

Source: PAN Europe