{"id":32051,"date":"2022-12-16T00:01:53","date_gmt":"2022-12-16T05:01:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/beyondpesticides.org\/dailynewsblog\/?p=32051"},"modified":"2022-12-15T21:08:29","modified_gmt":"2022-12-16T02:08:29","slug":"denying-science-manufacturing-doubt-monsanto-bayers-promotion-and-defense-of-glyphosate-roundup","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/beyondpesticides.org\/dailynewsblog\/2022\/12\/denying-science-manufacturing-doubt-monsanto-bayers-promotion-and-defense-of-glyphosate-roundup\/","title":{"rendered":"Denying Science, Manufacturing Doubt: Monsanto\/Bayer’s Promotion and Defense of Glyphosate\/Roundup"},"content":{"rendered":"\r\n

(Beyond Pesticides<\/em>, December 16, 2022) A report released last week \u2014 Merchants of Poison: How Monsanto Sold the World on a Toxic Pesticide<\/em><\/a> \u2014 exposes not only Bayer\/Monsanto malfeasance in its \u201cpromotion\u201d of its glyphosate<\/a>-based herbicide products, including the notorious Roundup\u00ae<\/a>, but also, the broader landscape of corporate efforts to white- or green-wash products that companies know are harmful to people and the environment. The report<\/a> was issued by U.S. Right to Know<\/a> (USRTK, a nonprofit investigative research group focused on promoting transparency for public health), Friends of the Earth<\/a> (FOE), and Real Food Media<\/a>. It carries the pithy subtitle, \u201cA case study in disinformation, corrupted science, and manufactured doubt about glyphosate,\u201d a description cited by the Friends of the Earth press release<\/a> as \u201cat the core of the pesticide industry\u2019s public relations playbook.\u201d Beyond Pesticides welcomes this report, which comports with much of our previous coverage of the pesticide industry\u2019s egregious misbehavior<\/a>, and of glyphosate<\/a>, the world\u2019s most widely used herbicide.<\/p>\r\n

FOE calls the report the \u201cfirst comprehensive review\u201d of the Bayer\/Monsanto \u201cdefense strategy\u201d employed in attempts to deny science, manufacture doubt, and discredit critics<\/a> who have researched, reported on, and\/or advocated against the company\u2019s flagship glyphosate products because of the harms they cause. Merchants of Poison<\/em><\/a> focuses on the swirl of bad actors and activity around glyphosate, including disinformation strategies used to manipulate the science of glyphosate, and disparage journalists and scientists who dared to publicize concerns about the compound\u2019s damage. According to FOE<\/a>, it also \u201creveals the astroturf operations, as well as front groups, professors, journalists, and others that [Bayer\/]Monsanto relied on to protect its profits from glyphosate despite decades of science linking the toxic chemical to cancer, reproductive impacts, and other serious health concerns.\u201d (See this recent Beyond Pesticides summary<\/a> of the health risks of pesticide exposures, and a deeper dive on glyphosate\u2019s and pesticides\u2019 broad environmental harms<\/a>, pp. 9 and 17, respectively.)<\/p>\r\n

The report, produced by lead author, journalist, and founder of USRTK Stacy Malkan, and co-authors Anna Lapp\u00e9 and Kendra Klein, PhD also places those activities in the historical context of the campaigns of Big Tobacco and Big Oil. Indeed, the tactics used by those industries show up at nearly every turn in the corporate pro-pesticide campaigns, which have even involved some of the same people and groups as the earlier efforts. Public \u201cspin\u201d operations by pesticide companies were especially robust after the 2015 release, by the United Nations International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), of findings concluding that there was \u201csufficient evidence of [glyphosate\u2019s] carcinogenicity<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\r\n

As the report pointedly says<\/a>, \u201cBig Tobacco\u2019s spin tactics arguably cost millions of lives as regulations emerged long after it was evident that cigarettes cause cancer \u2014 and continue to cost lives. (The WHO estimates 8 million people die annually from tobacco use). The fossil fuel sector\u2019s spin pushed science denialism and political inaction that has led to a warming world and is associated with millions of deaths per year, with few clear pathways to averting catastrophic climate change.\u201d<\/p>\r\n

Ms. Malkan commented<\/a>, \u201cThe pesticide industry is not just following in the footsteps of Big Tobacco and Big Oil, they co-wrote the playbook \u2014 from their attacks on\u00a0Silent Spring<\/em>\u00a0author Rachel Carson 60 years ago to the recent Monsanto-led assault on the cancer researchers of the World Health Organization.\u201d The pesticide industry similarly indulges in deceptive and unethical public relations strategies in order to keep its so-called \u201cfreedom to operate\u201d \u2014 essentially, with few or no restrictions \u2014 even while its products have dangerous consequences for public health and the environment.<\/p>\r\n

The industry has, for decades, engaged in knowingly deceptive and aggressive tactics<\/a> to (1) persuade the public that pesticides are not only \u201csafe,\u201d but also, somehow \u201ccritical\u201d to producing enough food for the world\u2019s population. Both claims are demonstrably false<\/a>. Beyond Pesticides has frequently written about the impressive capacity of organic, regenerative, agroecological agriculture<\/a> to produce high-quality and sufficient food supplies and improve the lot of producers \u2014 as well as being key to turning around the public health<\/a>, biodiversity<\/a>, and climate crises<\/a>. Merchants of Poison<\/em> asserts<\/a>: \u201cIn recent years, groundbreaking global studies have shown the grave threat agricultural chemicals pose to biodiversity and public health and how they fail to deliver on their promises for greater agricultural productivity, leading to crop loss and weed and pest resistance. Yet despite the mounting evidence, the pesticide industry has doubled down on deceptive messaging.\u201d<\/p>\r\n

Merchants of Poison<\/em><\/a> is the result of a years-long USRTK investigation, starting in 2015, which analyzed documents from all levels of government, universities, and industry, as well as from the work of investigative journalists, such as Cary Gillam, author of the groundbreaking Monsanto Papers<\/em><\/a>. The tens of thousands of pages of documents reviewed were secured through a combination of publicly available information, FOIA (Freedom of Information Act) and state-level public records requests, and proceedings from litigation \u2014 sometimes obtained as a result of judicial enforcement of public records laws \u2014 brought by groundskeepers, farmers, and just plain gardeners who (often successfully<\/a>) sued Monsanto over claims that exposure to its glyphosate herbicide, Roundup\u00ae, caused their subsequent cancers, often non-Hodgkin Lymphoma. Many of those documents can be accessed here<\/a>.<\/p>\r\n

The report sets out several key points:<\/p>\r\n