France will vote against a five-year extension of the license for weed-killer glyphosate that the European Commission is slated to propose on November 27. According to Brune Poirson, junior French environment minister, France will vote against it.
“The Commission will put one single proposition on the table on [November 27]: renewing glyphosate [license] for five years. In view of the risks, France will oppose this proposition and vote against it,” Brune Poirson said in an editorial in French Sunday newspaper Journal du Dimanche.
As reported by the Reuters news agency, 14 of the 28 European Union member states voted in favour of extending the license when the EU voted on the issue on November 9 with nine against and five abstentions. Under EU rules, 16 favourable votes are needed as a “qualified majority” for renewal before authorisation expires on December 15.
Glyphosate has been used by farmers for more than 40 years but its use was cast in doubt when WHO’s cancer agency said in 2015 it probably causes cancer.
But the European Chemical Agency said in March this year that there was no evidence linking it to cancer in humans.
