Suriname announces import ban on Glyphosate

Suriname has officially banned the import of Glyphosate. The import ban on Glyphosate reportedly went into effect on January 1, 2019. Carmen van Dijk, head of the Herbicides Department of the Ministry of Agriculture, pointed out that the import ban has been anchored in a decree. The sale of Glyphosate will officially be prohibited on January 1, 2021. The decision was made to protect the citizens. Suriname also made the decision to ban Glyphosate to follow international guidelines regarding the use of dangerous herbicides. Van Dijk also pointed out that other countries have already banned the import of Glyphosate. Glyphosate, an herbicide that remains the world’s most ubiquitous weed killer, raises the cancer risk of those exposed to it by 41 percent a new analysis says. Researchers from the University of Washington evaluated existing studies into the chemical -- found in weed killers including Monsanto’s popular Roundup -- and concluded that it significantly increases the risk of nonHodgkin lymphoma (NHL), a cancer of the immune system. “All of the metaanalyses conducted to date, including our own, consistently report the same key finding: exposure to GBHs (glyphosatebased herbicides) are associated with an increased risk of NHL,” the authors wrote in a study published in the journal Mutation Research. In 2015 the World Health Organization’s International Agency for Research on Cancer classified glyphosate as “probably carcinogenic to humans.” Moreover, the chemical has triggered multiple lawsuits from people who believe that exposure to the herbicide caused their nonHodgkin’s lymphoma.