Much has been said about the herbicide glyphosate over the last decade. The growing global movement against the toxic herbicide primarily led by farmers and sustainable agriculture practitioners are now fighting back. Now, the call to ban glyphosate is louder than ever.
In the Philippines, the use of glyphosate is tied with the use of GM corn. Like the GM corn, there have been no safety studies conducted on the impacts of these products to human health and environment, yet accounts from the communities are rife with the alarming experiences of the use of glyphosate. One such community is in Brgy. Guinbialan in the municipality of Maayon in Capiz. According to an initial documentation, the cases of residents getting sick with cancer have risen in the past ten years.
This is what propelled a team of researchers from MASIPAG to study the presence and persistence of the herbicide in the said community in 2018. Along with key members of the peoples’ organization in Guinbialan through citizen science research, the group conducted testing on the presence of glyphosate in the corn, humans, soil and water sources in the community, using the Dipstick strip test. MASIPAG sought to expose that glyphosate is present and pervasive in the main resources in the community including water sources and soil during the cropping season.
The release of the study can not be more timely, in the advent of the major flood that occurred in provinces in Cagayan and Isabela. Mayor Tin Antonio of Alcala, Cagayan reported the findings of a study by Dr Siringan on the impact of widespread planting of yellow corn and herbicide use that contributed to the rapid flooding in the province of Cagayan. MASIPAG strongly believes that the culprit behind is the planting of GM corn and the use of the herbicide Glyphosate.
Now, we present to the global community the findings of our study. You can read the whole report on this link.