France Partially Opposes EU’s 5-year Renewal for Monsanto’s Glyphosate

France will oppose a European Commission proposal to renew authorization for controversial weedkiller glyphosate for five years instead of 10, said on Sunday an official from the Environment Ministry ahead of a vote by the 28 EU member states in Brussels on Thursday.

Brune Poirson, the secretary of state of the Ministry for Environmental Transition, restated that the position of the government had not changed and will propose the renewal of the license for a maximum of four years.

France had previously stated that it would fully oppose the proposal, until Environment Minister Nicolas Hulot eventually announced a prorogation for a maximum four years.

The Commission, the EU’s executive arm, had originally recommended approving the herbicide’s use for another decade from December 15 but experts balked amid growing uproar over its alleged dangers.

The EU Parliament voted against the renewal of the license.

Monsanto, the US agro-giant that makes weedkiller Roundup, insists glyphosate meets the standards required to renew its European license.

Glyphosate critics, led by environmental campaigners Greenpeace, are calling for an outright ban in Europe and last month activists handed the EU a petition signed by more than 1.3 million people backing such a move.

They point to a 2015 study by the World Health Organization’s (WHO) International Agency for Research on Cancer that concluded it was “probably carcinogenic”.

The current license for using glyphosate expires on December 15.

The herbicide is used primarily on corn, cotton, soybean, oilseed and sugar beet crops, all of which have been genetically engineered to resist the weedkiller.

Environmentalists say the compound is less selective with other natural foliage and can kill trees, causing irreversible damage to habitats and biodiversity.

Recent statistics show that traces of the herbicide were found in 45 percent of Europe’s topsoil, 60 percent of grain products in the U.K. and in the urine of three-quarters of Germans participating in the research project.