Glyphosate In Our Food Supply
On October 23, 2018, a California judge rejected an appeal from the company Monsanto to overturn a jury verdict, which found its pesticide "Roundup," or glyphosate, causes cancer. In August 2018, Dewayne Johnson was awarded 289 million dollars (this award was later reduced to 78 million dollars) for asserting that his exposure to glyphosate, as a former groundskeeper, caused his non-Hodgkins lymphoma. Glyphosate is the number one herbicide used in the United States. Over 300 million pounds of this herbicide is applied to US farmland each year. It was introduced in the 1970s, and its usage has increased by 200-fold in the last 40 years. More recently, farmers have been spraying it on nonorganic crops to dry them out, so they don't have to wait the extra two weeks or so to naturally dry out. This process is known as desiccation. One of the problems with glyphosate is its motility in our environment and the lack of biodegradability. It is sprayed on nonorganic and GM