I have been a farmer all my working life. I graduated from one of Canada’s most respected agricultural colleges and grew up to accept all technical information printed or disclosed by top scientists and agricultural colleges in the world. As a farmer, I was in the first wave to adopt newly proven agricultural practices.
I have used dozens of newly released hybrid seeds, chemicals and experimental practices during my 50 years of farming. Some of these seeds, chemicals and practices disappeared almost as quickly as they appeared.
The most successful and widely used weed killer in the world, (hundreds of billions of dollars worth of glyphosate which is commonly called Roundup because of the manufacturer, Monsanto) is sold yearly. This chemical has changed the way many crops in the developed world have been grown.

My dad used to plow a field, cultivate it a couple times, leaving time between cultivations for weeds to germinate, plant the field and then row crops like corn were cultivated several times between the rows until the crop was too high.
Since Roundup was introduced a few decades ago today’s accepted practice is to spray a field with it in fall to kill all vegetation, no-till plant the crop with a specially built, heavy no-till planter, spray the GMO crop with Roundup after the crop and weeds have emerged. Sometimes the crop is sprayed again with Roundup before harvest to kill any weeds that escaped the first couple of sprays.
Many grain crops like wheat, barley, etc. are also sprayed before harvest to kill weeds and the grain so that everything will be dry before harvest and hence combining and getting a dry and cleaner grain will be much easier.
Ever since I harvested a test plot 25 years ago that included several GMO varieties, where I noticed that neither wild animals nor birds ate or even touched the GMO varieties while they devastated many of the non-GMO varieties, I have kept a very close eye on information both for and against GMO’s and Roundup.
In August of 2018, a groundskeeper of school yards in California who has terminal cancer, sued the manufacturer of Roundup for not putting warnings on the packages of Roundup.
During the court case it was disclosed that the manufacturer had withheld evidence that they had previously known that there were links between glyphosate and cancer.
The court ruled in favor of the cancer victim and awarded the maximum punitive damage allowed by the state of $39 million to the former groundskeeper.
There are many countries in the world that do not condone GMO’s and some countries can even imprison those found buying, selling or growing GMO’s.
I have used both GMO’s and Roundup on our farm and many of my farming friends have become accustomed to the new technology.
I have also watched too many of my friends and neighbours battle cancer in recent years and also watched many of them die from cancer.
There have been thousands of tests completed on our foods for glyphosate residue and some come back showing much higher levels than accepted by the FDA or other health boards. We still see no labels or warnings on packages of amounts or even if a food contains any GMO.
I have made a mental list of these foods because my digestive system will not tolerate them. It must be annoying for someone who is similarly affected and still cannot get any warning on labels or menus.
If you regularly use antacids it is a warning sign that there is something in what you ate that shouldn’t be there for you.
Not everyone is allergic to penicillin, sea food, peanuts, or has had any family member die from cancer but some people are different. All our friends are important.

Chris Judd is a farmer in Clarendon
on land that has been in his
family for generations.
gladcrest@gmail.com