Willie Penrose (Longford-Westmeath, Labour)
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566. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine the policy considerations that are undertaken by his Department in relation to the applications of glyphosate as part of the dessication process; if his Department has had consultations with the Department of Health in relation to its safety from a health perspective and its efficacy; if it's use has been reassessed in the context of reports from the WHO, New Zealand, Australia and the United States; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [40195/16]

Michael Creed (Cork North West, Fine Gael)
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My Department is the “Competent Authority” responsible for the approval of pesticides (Plant Protection Products & Biocide Products). A cohort of specialists including human toxicologists, environmental toxicologists, chemists, environmental chemists, efficacy experts and biologists enable all necessary decisions to be made without routine consultation with the Department of Health.

The use of products containing Glyphosate as a desiccant is currently restricted to use in oilseed rape. All risk assessments supporting this use, conducted internally or by our EU or international equivalents, support the fact that this use is safe not only from an environmental perspective but also from a human toxicology point of view.

To facilitate continued approval of glyphosate in the EU, an evaluation was performed by Germany and peer reviewed by the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) and Member State experts. This review clearly identified the safety profile of glyphosate and considered a recent review conducted by World Health Organisation (WHO). Reviews conducted by the relevant authorities in New Zealand, Australia and the United States derive similar but less conservative conclusions. In addition a further review of glyphosate by the European Chemicals Agency is currently on-going. This review will consider the classification of the active substance and should be available in the later part of 2017.