[tomato] Round Up... Unfortunately...
Tantrika (Tomato@GlobalGarden.com)
Sun, 27 Jun 1999 18:59:13 -0700
Before you automatically believe Monsanto's claims. Consider also,
Monsanto's one most popular selling chemical is roundup... Wish their
claims were true, but I don't believe a chemical corp especially one
involved in the Terminator Seed creation.
Round-Up Problems:
Compiled by Caroline Cox, Northwest Coalition for Alternatives to
Pesticides- (NCAP)
Roundup, and related herbicides with glyphosate as an active ingredient,
are advertised as products that can "eradicate weeds and unwanted grasses
effectively with a high level of environmental safety." However, an
independent, accurate evaluation of their health and environmental hazards
can draw conclusions very different from those presented in the ads.
Consider these facts:
1. Glyphosate can be persistent. In tests conducted by Monsanto,
manufacturer of glyphosate-containing herbicides, up to 140 days were
required for half of the applied glyphosate to break down or disappear from
agricultural soils. At harvest, residues of glyphosate were found in
lettuce, carrots, and barley planted one year after glyphosate treatment.
2. Glyphosate can drift. Test conducted by the University of California,
Davis, found that glyphosate drifted up to 400 meters (1300 feet) durng
ground applications and 800 meters 12600 feet) during aerial applications.
3. Glyphosate is acutely toxic to humans. Ingesting about 3/4 of a cup can
be lethal. Symptoms include eye and skin irritation, lung congestion, and
erosion of the intestinal tract. Between 1984 and 1990 in California,
glyphosate was the third most frequently reported cause of illness related
to agricultural pesticide use.
4. Glyphosate has shown a wide spectrum of chronic toxicity in laboratory
tests. The National Toxicology Program found that chronic feeding of
glyphosate caused salivary gland lesions, reduced sperm counts, and a
lengthened estrous cycle (how often an individual comes into heat). Other
chronic effects found in laboratory tests include an increase in the
frequency of lethal mutations in fruit flies, an increase in frequency of
pancreas and liver tumors in male rats along with an increase in the
frequency of thyroid tumors in females, and cataracts. (ne fruit fly study
used Roundup; the other studies used glyphosate.)
5. Roundup contains toxic trade secret ingredients. These include
polyethoxylated tallowamines, causing nausea and diarrhea, and
isopropylamine, causing chemical pneumonia, laryngitis, headache, and bums.
6. Roundup kills beneficial insects. Tests conducted by The International
Organization for Biological Control showed that Roundup caused mortality of
live beneficial species: a Thrichgramma, a predatory mite, a lacewing, a
ladybug, and a predatory beetle.
7. Glyphosate is hazardous to earthworms, Tests using New Zealand's most
common earthworm showed that glyphosate, in amounts as low as 1/20 of
standard application rates, reduced its growth and slowed its development.
8. Roundup inhibits mycorrhizal fungi. Canadian studies have shown that as
little as 1 part per million of Roundup can reduce the growth or
colonization of mycorrhizal fungi.
9. Glyphosate reduces nitrogen fixation. Amounts as small as 2 parts per
million have had significant effects, and effects have been measured up to
120 days after treatment. Nitrogen- fixing bacteria shown to be impacted by
glyphosate include a species found on soybeans and several species found on
clover.
10. Roundup can increase the spread or severity of plant diseases.
Treatment with roundup increased the severity of Rhizoctonia root rot in
barley, increased the amount and growth of take-all fungus, a wheat
disease), and reduced the ability of bean plants to defend themselves
against anthracnose.
These facts about Roundup are taken From a two-part article about the
health and environmental hazards of glyphosate published in NCAP's Journal
of Pesticide Reform. Copies of the article, with complete references for
all of .the information presented, are available from NCAP for $2.00. NCAP,
PO Box 1391; Eugene, OR 97440; (541) 344-5044.