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Comment by jaredhallen | Hacker News Reader

Glyphosate is used because it works.

Not only does it work, it's by far the safest herbicide we've used so far. People love to complain about herbicides, pesticides and fungicides, but they're the same people who would complain if their food was suddenly 8x the price because farm yields would go back to the pitiful amount it was before we had these chemicals.

I've worked in agriculture for a couple years while doing my Biology undergrad. People who used chemicals had a HUGE increase in yields vs others.

Be thankful we're not longer using things like Agent Orange and DDT.

Yeah that's all fair.

But the problem is that since as the safety improves so does how people use it. More safe means we can use more since it's not as scary.

It's so safe we can spray it on the wheat two weeks before harvest to make sure it's good and dry. Hopefully it doesn't rain!

It "works". It kills weeds but there are externalities that are not accounted for with such a narrow view.

If it's causing problems it may actually work more for the party profiting than the rest. "It just works" is lazy...

I use it to kill the driveway weeds, works like a charm.

Well, let us know if/when you or your kids get kidney disease or any of the other listed diseases associated with it. I feel knowing the dangers and using it anyway should auto opt-out one out of the class action settlement. Ever try a weed eater or gloves? Gasoline would work just as well, probably less toxic

You're a lot less likely to get roundup in your system from killing weeds outside than eating vegetables and fruits that have been bathed in it.

You don’t spray roundup over vegetables and fruits

Farms do.

No. It's a weedkiller. Putting it ON the fruits would be expensive and useless.

In conventional/industrial agriculture, its used after harvest and before seeding. In intelligent agriculture , it's used a day before seeding.

Its also sprayed on crops as a desiccant shortly before harvest.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crop_desiccation#Systemic_desi...

> No. It's a weedkiller. Putting it ON the fruits would be expensive and useless.

So, why Monsanto went all the trouble of developing GMO crops resistant to it, if it is intended just for the weeds?

There is roundup-ready Cotton, Soybeans, Corn and Canola, that I am aware of. My family grows Roundup-ready cotton. The other 2 are used for animal feed; in no case is any farmer going to be spraying it when it is fruiting, because once the weeds have got to that point you've already lost all the benefit of it being 'roundup ready' - where the purpose is for weeds to be killed so they don't take the moisture which is now conserved for the crop.

There are no roundup-ready vegetables that I am aware of, or fruits.

The seed of corn is a fruit, my guy. I'm talking botanically, not culinary.

There's RR Alfalfa as well, but your point still stands.

Typically, yes that's the recommendation.

That doesn't mean it won't be applied at any other time if there's weed issues during other periods of the cycle, or that the farmer will apply it at the right time. A lot of farmers don't know when to apply herbicides, or won't until there are issues to save money.

I was working with a farmer who did most of it by hand or machine and he only needed to apply glyphosate twice in his 20 years as a farmer.

Round up or other herbicides are commonly used to uniformly kill and dry out mature wheat, corn, and other grains so harvesting and processing is easier.

I read the OP as making a specific claim about agricultural (not botanical) fruit harvests, not like the grains you mentioned.

I'm not eating the weeds.

Of course, eating weeds is the only way to get exposed to environmental carcinogens ... that you just poured on your driveway. gotcha

It works at giving people chronic kidney disease and killing them. Probably it shouldn't be used or legal to use it.

Every alternative will kill even more people. Other herbicides are even more dangerous, and not using herbicide will cause food prices to go up. High food prices kill far more people than herbicides do.

There are other alternatives than use a herbicide that kills a certain number of people. The thing is that massive multi-billion dollar companies absolutely try to sabotage any consideration of the safety of their pesticides, because it's so much money to them. If you are a researcher, you'll be getting into a fraught area if you are doing a study to validate it's safety. It's similar to looking into climate science - the crazies will come for you, and probably the pseudo-non-climate-scientist people taking money from exxon.

> There are other alternatives than use a herbicide that kills a certain number of people.

Like what? What impact would that have on food prices? Glyphosate costs $10 / acre, or maybe 15 cents per bushel of wheat.

>Other herbicides are even more dangerous, and not using herbicide will cause food prices to go up ... This research brought to you by Mansanto :D

Right. Farmers and other end users don't give a crap whether it's "profitable for Monsanto" or not.

Probably half of them are buying the Tractor Supply knock-off brand, anyway.

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