On January 22, 2025, Safe Food Matters will be in court again, fighting over glyphosate. Our original – still ongoing -lawsuit was about Health Canada’s decision to register glyphosate (“Registration Decision”), and this one is about the 5 year renewal of a product that contains the pesticide. Details on how to attend in person or watch are at the end of this piece.
This fight is about the product “Mad Dog Plus”, and the fact that the Pest Management Regulatory Agency (PMRA) routinely renews products, on a 5 year basis, without looking into new science on risks arising after major registration decisions.
In 2022 a coalition of groups, us included, provided the PMRA with a list of studies on glyphosate showing new risks, and it appears PMRA did not look into them – at least they couldn’t provide any evidence to show they did.
Mad Dog Plus is used on crops, forests, and industrial and recreational spaces. One agriculture use is pre-harvest spraying on wheat, barley, oats, canola, flax, peas, lentils, dry beans, soybeans and forages – and it is this very use that we challenged, and continue to challenge, in our original lawsuit.
In that original suit, we went all the way to the Federal Court of Appeal and back to PMRA, who rejected our concerns over pre-harvest use. So we sued them again. New science now shows we were right about at least one of our concerns on pre-harvest use.
What is interesting is the following: In the Mad Dog Plus lawsuit, PMRA actually relies on the evaluation for the Registration Decision to assure us the science for the renewal is sound – but this original evaluation itself is an open issue because we are still challenging it in court in our original case. How does that work?
Our hope is that a win in the Mad Dog Plus case will require PMRA to assess new science before renewing any pesticide products, instead of just rubber-stamping them. And that the free pass PMRA has given to glyphosate products for decades will finally be pulled.
*****
We are suing in this Mad Dog Plus case along with Environmental Defence, the David Suzuki Foundation and Friends of the Earth Canada. Ecojustice is representing us. The filings for the Mad Dog Plus case (T-169-23), and our original lawsuit (T-277-19 and T-2292-22), can be found on our Filings Page.
People can attend in person, or by video conference. Case No. T-169-23. Friends of the Earth Canada et al. v. AGC et al.
IN PERSON: The hearing will be held at 10 am on Wednesday, January 22, 2025 in Federal Court at Toronto (180 Queen Street West, suite 200) Room 5D (5th floor) for those wanting to attend in person.
VIDEO: Please register many days ahead of the hearing.
- To register, click here: https://www.fct-cf.gc.ca/en/court-files-and-decisions/hearing-lists
- Scroll down to the hearings list, and look for court file no: T-169-23 for Toronto on the hearing date of January 22. Or, in the upper right corner, search the court file no: T-169-23.
- Click on the “register button” on the left side of this listing and enter your name and email address.
Please note that (1) recording, publishing, broadcasting, reproducing, photographing, or otherwise disseminating the video, audio, or any photograph of this hearing is prohibited; and (2) each person must register – sharing a link is prohibited.
Our legal fight against glyphosate and other harmful substances can also be supported through donations, which we gratefully and greatly appreciate – you’ll get a Canadian charity tax receipt.
Thanks for your support!