Check out this answer from Consensus:
Current evidence suggests that glyphosate levels in cereals are generally within regulatory safety limits and do not pose significant health risks to consumers. However, the potential long-term effects and the adequacy of existing safety standards remain subjects of ongoing research and debate. Continued monitoring and updated risk assessments are essential to ensure the safety of glyphosate residues in food products.
Glyphosate, the active ingredient in many herbicides, is widely used in agriculture to control weeds and enhance crop yields. Its pervasive use has led to concerns about its presence in food products, particularly cereals, and its potential health risks. This article examines whether the levels of glyphosate found in cereals are safe for human consumption, drawing on recent research findings.
Glyphosate Usage and Residue in Cereals
Glyphosate is extensively applied to cereal crops for weed control and as a desiccant before harvest. This widespread use has resulted in detectable residues in various food products, including cereals. Studies have shown that glyphosate residues are commonly found in grains and processed foods, raising public health concerns1 3 5.
Regulatory Standards and Compliance
Regulatory agencies worldwide have established maximum residue limits (MRLs) for glyphosate in food products to ensure safety. For instance, the European Union and the United States have set specific tolerance levels for glyphosate residues in cereals. Research indicates that the majority of food samples, including cereals, comply with these regulatory limits. A study analyzing glyphosate residues in Canadian food products found a high compliance rate of 99.4%, with no long-term health risks identified for consumers3. Similarly, another study reported that 99% of glyphosate residues in food were below the European MRLs or U.S. EPA tolerances4.
Health Concerns and Toxicity
Despite regulatory compliance, there are ongoing debates about the safety of glyphosate residues in food. Some studies suggest that glyphosate and its commercial formulations could have toxic effects even at levels below regulatory limits. These effects include endocrine disruption, oxidative stress, and potential carcinogenicity2 6 9. The World Health Organization’s International Agency for Research on Cancer has classified glyphosate as “probably carcinogenic to humans,” further fueling concerns9.
Dietary Exposure and Risk Assessment
Dietary exposure assessments indicate that the levels of glyphosate residues in cereals and other foods are generally within established safe limits. For example, a study on Swiss market foods concluded that glyphosate residues did not exceed acceptable daily intake or acute reference doses, posing no significant health risk5. Additionally, measurements of glyphosate in urine suggest that human exposure is well below the current European acceptable daily intake4.
Are glyphosate levels in cereals safe?
Robin Mesnage has answered Likely
An expert from King’s College London in Toxicology, Bioinformatics
There is no study showing health effects of glyphosate at the concentration at which it is present in cereals, for a normal cereal consumption. It is thus unlikely that glyphosate residues will have an effect in this exposure scenario. However, it is important to note that glyphosate has never been tested for its lifelong effects. Only long term effects on adult animals have been tested in the battery of regulatory tests. There are thus gaps in glyphosate risk assessment, and it is not possible to conclude with certainty that concentrations of glyphosate below regulatory limits are safe.
Are glyphosate levels in cereals safe?
Leanne F Baker has answered Likely
An expert from University of Waterloo in Toxicology, Environmental Science, Biology, Limnology, Fisheries Sciences
By the strict toxicological definition of the word “safe” (explained below), recent findings suggest that there are technically unsafe levels of glyphosate in some cereals. However, we are unlikely to see any acute illnesses resulting from these “unsafe” concentrations. So, in the broader common definition of the word safe, the answer would be that there is unlikely to be unsafe concentrations of glyphosate in cereals.
There is lots of evidence of glyphosate residues being detected in food products. Monsanto (now Bayer) has created genetically-modified crop plants, particularly corn, soy, sorghum, canola. These plants can be directly sprayed with Roundup (a glyphosate-based herbicide) and not suffer any damage. These grains in particular would have higher residues of glyphosate.
A study by the Environmental Working Group (an independent non-profit organization in America) recently found that many cereals had levels of glyphosate that were above European food safety guidelines. Safety guidelines are usually developed by running lots of toxicity tests on different animals to determine the lowest concentration that causes any detectable effect on any animal. This concentration is then divided by an arbitrary safety factor (maybe something like 10 or 100) to make sure that we allow only a tiny fraction of the effects-causing concentration so that we would never see any negative effects in people. This is how the toxicology community defines the word “safe”. Concentratations that are above the safety guideline but below the concentration where we’ve seen effects on animals are probably not likely to cause any acute illnesses in healthy people. It’s not likely that we would see someone getting poisoned from eating these cereals so long as the concentration is low enough.
However, we now have mounting evidence that glyphosate exposure can lead to cancer. This occurs in people who are heavily-exposed, usually by inhalation, such as farmers or groundskeepers. We don’t think that glyphosate accumulates significantly in the body by ingesting contaminated cereals, so it’s hard to say if there would be long term effects of eating these glyphosate laced products. Because cancer is a very slow-developing illness, it often takes many years/decades before we can know for certain whether glyphosate would cause a casual consumer to become ill with a chronic illness like cancer.
Are glyphosate levels in cereals safe?
Marek Cuhra has answered Uncertain
An expert from Institute of Marine Research in Toxicology, Marine Ecology
I am honored to be asked in this matter.
Such opinion-poll request for scientifically based answers on more-or-less specific questions is a somewhat unconventional way to present scientific arguments, and as a toxicologist who has been working with glyphosate since 2008, I would rather not answer the question as likely or unlikely, but instead respond with a loud and clear maybe.
This is a pragmatic consequence of the present situation, – unfortunately we do not have the scientific consensus to say either safe or unsafe regarding glyphosate safety levels. Because, the science is divided: most industry scientists say its safe, but many independent scientists do not agree. Some independent scientist even bring forward evidence which demonstrates that the safety-assessments of glyphosate performed by industry, are not reliable evidence of safety.
A few of my scientific contributions on the glyphosate-safety issue are here, here and here.
Those papers present three somewhat different angles on the issue, – the first two are reviews of a) general and b) specific issues of glyphosate toxicity (the question of glyphosate residues is discussed in that second paper, basically concluding that there is a great deal of agnotology clouding that issue).
The third paper is a commentary on the regrettable lack of response from industry producing those chemicals, – many scientists in industry-funded laboratories ignore critical findings presented by independent (in our case government funded) research groups.
Final remark
concerning the CNN report: the fact that a ngo, – the Environmental Working Group -, finds that the levels of glyphosate in childrens food exceed norms which they — based on their criteria which I do not know — find safe, is interesting from several points of view: First of all, it demonstrates mistrust in the regulatory efforts and recommendations provided by regulatory authorities such as in this case the US FDA. Furthermore, it is a sad manifestation of the desperation felt by some consumers (and parents of small consumers) when faced with a regulatory system which apparently has some hesitation at simply stating that documentation showns beyond doubt, that biotech industry has not been able to uphold such standards in their risk-assessments, as to deserve continued public trust.
in my opinion the producers of various potentially disrupting or toxic chemicals should not themselves perform the risk-assessments of their commercial products. Such risk-assessments should be performed by independent researchers, preferably in institutions that are certified by trustworthy national or international regulatory agencies.
Are glyphosate levels in cereals safe?
Verónica Laura Lozano has answered Unlikely
An expert from Universidad de Buenos Aires in Ecology, Toxicology
We have observed that very low concentration of Roundup (0.1 ppb) has long-term impacts on female gut microbiome in rats. Gut microbiome has a lot of known and unknown functions in health maintenance.
Work: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2214750017301129
Are glyphosate levels in cereals safe?
Gideon Meyerowitz-Katz has answered Likely
An expert from University of Wollongong in Epidemiology, Public Health, Diabetes
The question about whether glyphosate is safe at normal levels of human consumption is contentious, but has been investigated widely. It’s worth remembering that when we talk about safety for glyphosate, we are invariably talking about the potential long-term health impacts of small doses, because in terms of the acute – i.e. short-term – effects, glyphosate is about as safe as table salt.
There have been some concerns raised that glyphosate may be causing a relatively rare type of cancer, called Non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. This is because a few rodent studies and two epidemiological studies have indicated that there may be a link between very high levels of exposure to glyphosate over a lifetime – like those experienced by farmers using the chemical every day. However, this link is very contentious, because the link is only seen at the highest levels of glyphosate exposure, and has not been found in most studies on the topic. In fact, the biggest and best study on the topic was published in 2018, and found no link whatsoever between glyphosate and cancer. There’s also no link between glyphosate and any other cancers aside from NHL.
There are also some studies looking at glyphosate and infertility, but similarly this link hasn’t been shown to exist in a reproducible way.
This is what has led most national health agencies to conclude that glyphosate is unlikely to pose a danger even at the highest levels of exposure, but this is only for the people who are exposed to hundreds or thousands of times the normal rate of glyphosate. When we look at the average person who eats products that contain glyphosate, who might be ingesting only nanograms of the product each day, there’s no evidence at all that glyphosate is harmful.
Since this reply was written, a new report was released by the Environmental Working Group on glyphosate in cereals. This report, despite the media coverage, similarly demonstrated that the glyphosate content of cereals is safe by the standards set by the EPA, APVMA, and the ECHA/EFSA.
Are glyphosate levels in cereals safe?
Jonathan G Lundgren has answered Unlikely
An expert from Ecdysis Foundation in Ecology, Entomology
How do you define safe?
Currently, risk assessment focuses primarily on the lethality of individual active ingredients to a narrow suite of indicator species under laboratory conditions.
With 20,000 pesticide formulations in the U.S. (the formulations seldom undergo risk assessments)…
With hundreds of just insect species in corn fields…
And considering that each species is a community of microbial symbionts…
That the most important non-target impacts of pesticides may be non-lethal (they may reduce mobility or reproduction, etc)…
And that pesticides and other stressors synergize to affect the risk scenario for a pesticide…
How can we possibly say that these chemistries are “safe” or not? This is not to say we should ban all pesticides. Rather, we should realize that 1) nobody is watching the risk of these chemistries, and 2) we need to use them with much more respect than we do now.
Diversity is the answer to pest problems, not more agrichemicals.
Our research and publications on these ideas can be found here https://www.ecdysis.bio/projects-1/
Are glyphosate levels in cereals safe?
Jarosław Lewkowski has answered Unlikely
An expert from University of Łódź in Organic Chemistry
I must agree with the statement given by Dr Marek Cuhra – it is strongly inconveinient to use one of four above words to describe the situation.
The problem with glyphosate and the Roundup preparation is more complex than it is described by journalists in headline news.
Glyphosate as a chemical compound is not as toxic as it is presented in headline news. The problem is that it has been and still is much overused. The moderate and reasonable use of glyphosate and Roundup would not lead to any problem, but when whole giantic fields are sprayed with large amounts of it, glyphosate becomes very toxic not because of its proper toxicity but because of the DOSE of it (just following the Paracelsus’ rule).
So to answer the initial question, probably glyphosate levels in cereals are not safe but considering what Dr Marek Cuhra has written there is no any reliably and evidently determined level of glyphosate, which can be considered as safe. That is what I can say as a scientist.
As a consumer, I can say that whenever possble, I try to buy vegetables and fruits directly from known farmers, of whom I know that they do not overuse pesticides. But for bread etc. I have to rely on naive conviction that nothing wrong can happen to me 🙂
Are glyphosate levels in cereals safe?
Francisco J Corpas has answered Likely
An expert from Spanish National Research Council in Biochemistry
For all the people interested in this topic it suggests to read the available information in the website of the European Food Safety Authority (https://ec.europa.eu/food/plant/ pesticides/glyphosate_en) that after the analyses of the available information, with other national authorities from Australia, Japan and Canada amongst others, concluded that there was no evidence to support that glyphosate can cause cancer in humans or other genetic damages
Are glyphosate levels in cereals safe?
Percilia Cardoso Giaquinto has answered Likely
An expert from Universidade Estadual Paulista in Physiology, Ethology
The Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) reported that glyphosate and its major metabolite, aminomethylphosphonic acid (AMPA), are of potential toxicological concern, mainly as a result of accumulation of residues in the food chain.
Harvested crops and/or food composites may contain glyphosate and AMPA residues at levels that are unlikely to result in exposure to the currently accepted TMDI through direct consumption. However, glyphosate and AMPA residues are clearly present in food that can be consumed by humans or livestock, and chronic exposure to glyphosate or AMPA through consumption of contaminated products may be a potential risk to human health. Recent research even suggests that there has been an increase in glyphosate in human urine samples (an indication of dietary exposure). This could be explained by the improved sensitivity of analytical techniques, but is also potentially a result of increased glyphosate usage (Niemann et al. 2015). Those authors suggested that the reported concentrations are not sufficient to be of concern to human health (Niemann et al. 2015). However, it is important to note that the literature on the risks of low concentration chronic exposure to glyphosate is minimal; Mesnage et al. (2015) suggest that low glyphosate concentrations may result in risks to human health and call for further studies to be undertaken before conclusions regarding the safety of glyphosate are made. It would therefore seem prudent to modify glyphosate application practises such that residues in the food are minimised, and as a matter of priority to undertake additional testing to better understand the risks.
Are glyphosate levels in cereals safe?
Folarin O Owagboriaye has answered Near Certain
An expert from Olabisi Onabanjo University in Ecophysiology, Toxicology
The uses of a glyphosate-based herbicide such as Roundup and diseases associated have been a major concern over the years. Glyphosate, owing to its status as the active ingredient in Monsanto Roundup herbicide, is therefore thought to be directly responsible for the various reported physiopathological conditions observed in the exposed animals. However, studies have proven otherwise. Roundup is very toxic, not due to its supposed active ingredient but as a result of surfactants in it (Brausch and Smith , 2007; Bradberry et al. 2004). Glyphosate alone in its pure form without being formulated is safe. Some scientific bodies have reportedly declared that glyphosate alone is not toxic and rather the adjuvants or surfactants that are added to aid absorption into plant tissues are toxic (FAO/WHO, 2005; FEE, 2013). This report has recently been confirmed by Dedeke et al. (2018) who submitted that glyphosate alone has no effect on rat even at higher dose of 248.4 mg/kg body weight/ day consumed for 12 weeks, but Roundup does. This indicates that the toxicity observed cannot be due to the active ingredient in the Roundup formulation.
Meanwhile, when considering the safety of cereals as result of presence of glyphosate, one question we should ask is: how does the glyphosate get into cereals in the first instance?
Glyphosate gets into cereals while spraying Roundup herbicide (and not glyphosate alone) on the crop as desiccant or pre-harvest, indicating that glyphosate and other ingredient such as surfactants would have been in the cereal. Therefore, if we are sure that only glyphosate without surfactants is found in the cereals regardless of the level, I would say it’s safe for consumption. Even if the level is above the 160 ppb benchmark (which provides a guide or reference on the daily amount of glyphosate that can be consumed by human without ill effects). The USA set 1.75 mg/kg body weight as the acceptable daily intake (ADI) of glyphosate while the European Union recently released 0.5 mg/kg body weight of glyphosate as the ADI compared to the benchmark.
Nevertheless, the level of glyphosate in the cereals would have been greatly reduced through the production procedures as glyphosate was not intentionally added. In addition, the low level of glyphosate in cereals may not pose any threat as an individual does not consume cereal always, making the glyphosate level in the system to be insignificant when it comes to toxicological assessment and negative effects.
May I therefore say that, presence of glyphosate ALONE without any trace of surfactants in cereals is safe for human consumption. But presence of glyphosate with surfactants that make up Roundup in cereals may not be safe. For instance, liver and kidney functional pathology was observed in rats administered ultra-low dose of 0.1 ppb Roundup for 2 years (Mesnage et al., 2015). In addition, Owagboriaye et al. (2017) among other studies reported reproductive toxicity off Roundup herbicide in rats.
In the light of this, glyphosate alone in cereals is safe. There is therefore need to also subject cereals into scrutiny and test for possible identification of surfactants, which can then make it unsafe.
Are glyphosate levels in cereals safe?
Channa Jayasumana has answered Extremely Unlikely
An expert from Rajarata University of Sri Lanka in Toxicology
No doubt glyphosate will soon become unthreshsold human carcinogen. It is almost like Arsenic.
Are glyphosate levels in cereals safe?
Nédia de Castilhos Ghisi has answered Unlikely
An expert from State University of Maringá in Toxicology
There are some indicators that the levels are not safe. But it is necessay to conduct a more intensive revision on this issue, to I give a more effective opinion.
Are glyphosate levels in cereals safe?
Oluwaseun O Babalola has answered Unlikely
An expert from Lagos State University in Toxicology
It is rather too early to categorize the current residual levels of Glyphosate in cereals as being safe for human health. The full exposure impact of this current level on human physiology, particularly on endocrine and reproductive systems, which functions at micro concentrations, is still largely unknown.
It is worth noting that the cereals are consumed more by infants and young children, who are at critical developmental phase. The health impacts on them could be severe and irreversible, due to quantitative and qualitative differences in pesticide absorption, metabolism, detoxification and excretion, relative to the adults. For some of us, who have observed the exposure effects of the Glyphosate on other lower animals in the laboratory, at micro concentrations, there are strong reasons to believe that the world has not seeing it all. All of us must therefore be on the side of caution, and avoid rushing into fallacy of hasty conclusion.
Are glyphosate levels in cereals safe?
Abbas Güngördü has answered Likely
An expert from Inonu University in Environmental Science
Increasing concentrations of almost all pesticides in the environment and cereal crops also increases the level of risk for human and other organisms. The same is true for glyphosate. My studies do not concern glyphosate concentrations in agricultural products and in the environment. However, there are records in the literature about high levels of glyphosate that may be a risk for living things. As a result of my studies, I can say that lethality data can be obtained when determining glyphosate effect in non-target organisms, but classical toxicity biomarkers are insufficient to determine the toxicity mechanism. In one of my studies, while oxidative stress and detoxification enzymes in glyphosate exposed frog embryos are less affected when compared to other pesticides, the protein structure of an enzyme changed in glyphosate exposed frog embryos. This is a data that needs to be taken seriously.