Glyphosate and GM plants

Glyphosate is a broad-spectrum systemic herbicide and crop desiccant. It is used

to kill weeds, especially annual broadleaf weeds and grasses that compete with
crops. It was discovered to be an herbicide by Monsanto chemist John E. Franz in
1970. Monsanto brought it to market in 1974 under the trade name Roundup,
and Monsanto's last commercially relevant United States patent expired in 2000.
Farmers quickly adopted glyphosate, especially after Monsanto introduced
glyphosate-resistant Roundup Ready crops, enabling farmers to kill weeds
without killing their crops. In 2007, glyphosate was the most used herbicide in
the United States' agricultural sector. By 2016 there was a 100-fold increase from
the late 1970s in the frequency of applications and volumes of glyphosate-based
herbicides applied.
Glyphosate is absorbed through foliage, and minimally through roots and
transported to growing points. It inhibits a plant enzyme involved in the
synthesis of three aromatic amino acids: tyrosine, tryptophan, and
phenylalanine. Therefore, it is effective only on actively growing plants and is not
effective as a pre-emergence herbicide. An increasing number of crops have
been genetically engineered to be tolerant of glyphosate (e.g. Roundup Ready
soybean, the first Roundup Ready crop, also created by Monsanto) which allows
farmers to use glyphosate as a post emergence herbicide against weeds.
Many regulatory and scholarly reviews have evaluated the relative toxicity of
glyphosate as an herbicide. The German Federal Institute for Risk Assessment
toxicology review in 2013 found that "the available data is contradictory and far
from being convincing" with regard to correlations between exposure to
glyphosate formulations and risk of various cancers. In March 2015 the World
Health Organization's International Agency for Research on Cancer classified
glyphosate as "probably carcinogenic in humans" based on epidemiological
studies, animal studies, and in vitro studies. In November 2015, the European
Food Safety Authority published an updated assessment report on glyphosate,
concluding that "the substance is unlikely to be genotoxic (damaging to DNA) or
to pose a cancer-causing threat to humans."
Glyphosate is effective in killing a wide variety of plants, including grasses and
broadleaf and woody plants. It is commonly used for agriculture, horticulture,
viticulture, and silviculture purposes, as well as garden maintenance. Some
micro-organisms have a version of the affected enzyme resistant to glyphosate
inhibition. A version of the enzyme that was both resistant to glyphosate and
that was still efficient enough to drive adequate plant growth was identified by
Monsanto scientists after much trial and error. This gene was cloned and
transfected into soybeans. In 1996, genetically modified soybeans were made
commercially available. Current glyphosate-resistant crops include soy, maize
(corn), canola, alfalfa, sugar beets, and cotton, with wheat still under
development.
Putting the aforementioned data together, it is clearly noticeable that Monsanto
has not thought about the consequences of using Glyphosate nor of GM plants.

The only effects they had in mind was the profit they could make with it and the
synergy those products together would have together. When it came to assuming
their products could have an effect not only in the environment (super weeds,
honey bees) but also in the consumers themselves, they tried to bury the
details or mislead the investigators, which is not a responsible nor ethical way to
act. Furthermore, their answer to the problem caused by their irresponsible
meddling with the environment is to promote modifying it to solve the more
immediate problem (most likely creating another problem as a consequence).
Needless to say, the main benefactor of all this is Monsanto itself gaining profit
as a company at the expense of the whole world.