This page is a part of the corpus (Annexe 1) used to write Stéphane Foucart and neonicotinoids.
Here, I relate what the journalist said in his article « Toutes les procédures d’évaluation des risques des pesticides sur les abeilles sont, au minimum, très discutables ». All quotes, originally in French, were translated by me.
Foucart echoes the criticism of the risk assessment procedure for AMM made by EFSA in 2012. He presents the problem as a “hoax” that an elementary school child could understand in a matter of minutes.
The reason is that “these protocols were designed by groups of experts infiltrated by the agrochemical industry.” A report from Future Generations and PAN suggests that this example is not in fact isolated: “in 92% of the cases examined, the techniques in question were co-developed by the manufacturers concerned, directly or indirectly. “
For David Demortain, sociologist at INRA, this report shows “that industry, through its own scientists, has invested, or even encouraged the creation of forums to discuss risk assessment methods” . He takes the example of the ILSI1 forum founded in the 1970s by the industrial giants of the agrochemicals. They have “sort of created the very scientific framework within which to evaluate their products.” “