The jury in San Francisco federal court said the company was liable for plaintiff Edwin Hardeman’s non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma.

It awarded $5 million in compensatory damages and $75 million in punitive damages to Hardeman after finding that Roundup was defectively designed, that Monsanto failed to warn of the herbicide’s cancer risk and that the company acted negligently (all figures US$).

Bayer bought Roundup maker Monsanto last year for $63 billion.

The company in a statement on Wednesday said it was disappointed with the jury’s decision and that it would appeal the verdict.

“This verdict does not change the weight of over four decades of extensive science and the conclusions of regulators worldwide that support the safety of our glyphosate-based herbicides and that they are not carcinogenic,” Bayer said.

The company added that the verdict in Hardeman’s case had no impact on future cases and trials, “as each one has its own factual and legal circumstances.”

The trial is only the second of more than 11,200 Roundup lawsuits set to go to trial in the United States. Previous litigation setbacks and a prior jury verdict against the company have sent Bayer shares plunging.

The verdict comes after the same jury on March 19 found Roundup to have been a “substantial factor” in causing Hardeman’s cancer, allowing the trial to proceed to a second phase to determine liability and damages. Bayer shares fell more than 12 per cent after last week’s jury finding.

In the trial’s second phase, Hardeman’s lawyers were able to present previously excluded internal documents allegedly showing the company’s efforts to influence scientists and regulators about the widely used product’s safety.

Lawyers for Hardeman were seen by a Reuters reporter cheering in the elevator outside the courtroom after the verdict was announced.

“As demonstrated throughout trial, since Roundup’s inception over 40 years ago, Monsanto refuses to act responsibly,” Hardeman’s lawyers said in a statement, adding that the company instead focused on “manipulating public opinion and undermining anyone who raises genuine and legitimate concerns about Roundup.”

‘Hasn’t sunk in’

After the verdict, Hardeman told reporters he was “overwhelmed.”

“It hasn’t sunk in yet,” he said.

Hardeman’s case was considered a bellwether trial to help determine the range of damages and define settlement options for the more than 760 other federal cases pending in the same court before U.S. District Judge Vince Chhabria.

In the first trial phase of Hardeman’s case, the jury deliberated for more than four days before finding Roundup responsible for the man’s cancer. Bayer on Wednesday said that was an indication that jurors were “very likely divided over the scientific evidence.”

The company said its appeal would focus on legal rulings by Chhabria, who allowed some of Hardeman’s scientific experts to testify despite calling plaintiffs’ expert opinions “shaky” in a 2018 ruling.

But legal experts have noted that the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which oversees the San Francisco federal court, has generally been permissive in allowing expert testimony.

Monsanto’s Roundup was the first to contain glyphosate, the world’s most widely used weed killer. But it is no longer patent-protected and many other versions are available. Bayer does not provide sales figures for the product.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the European Chemicals Agency and other regulators have found that glyphosate is not likely carcinogenic to humans. The World Health Organization’s cancer arm in 2015 reached a different conclusion, classifying glyphosate as “probably carcinogenic to humans.”

In the first U.S. Roundup trial, another California man was awarded $289 million in August after a state court jury found Roundup caused his cancer. That award was later reduced to $78 million and is on appeal.

Hardeman’s case featured a significant difference from that trial after Chhabria decided to split cases before him into two phases: one to decide causation on purely scientific grounds, the other to determine Bayer’s potential liability and damages only if the jury first ruled that the weed killer was a substantial factor in causing cancer.

That decision had been seen as beneficial to Bayer. Legal experts said the jury’s verdict in the first phase of the Hardeman case was a significant setback, narrowing the company’s legal options going forward.

Chhabria has scheduled another bellwether trial for May and a third trial is likely to also take place this year. All three will be split into causation and liability phases.

Bayer is also scheduled to face another Roundup trial in California state court beginning on March 28 and at least two trials in Missouri state court in the fall.

–– Reporting for Reuters by Alexandria Sage in San Francisco; writing by Tina Bellon in New York.

The post U.S. jury says Bayer must pay $80 million to man in Roundup cancer trial appeared first on Manitoba Co-operator.

Duck fat has a rich history in French cuisine as the key ingredient in savoury cassoulets and confits, but now industrious farmers are turning the grease into biodiesel and biogas.

A farm co-operative based in St. Aquilin, a rural village in the southwestern region of the Dordogne, is powering a tractor and two other vehicles with biodiesel made from duck fat and hopes to convince others to do the same.

The animal product is in no short supply in this scenic area where two million of the web-footed birds are raised each year, according to the regional agricultural council.

“We’re really doing this out of activism, to recognize that we have to do something to help save the planet. We should stop the big speeches and start with little acts,” said Jules Charmoy, who raises russet-hued Limousin cattle on his organic farm.

Concerned about the world’s reliance on oil, Charmoy and a partner identified a recycling need close to home given the profusion of duck used by many restaurants and food businesses.

Their 50-farm co-operative of like-minded farmers collects the fat from neighbouring businesses once every two weeks, and then makes a veritable duck soup that will end up as fuel.

“We also have frying oil and fat from pigs and calves. There’s a little bit of everything in there but the dominant thing is duck because we’re in the Dordogne,” said Charmoy, 37.

Before being used as vehicle fuel it is mixed in a 30 to 70 per cent ratio with diesel as per French law, said Charmoy.

The group produced 20,000 litres (4,399 Imp. gallons) last year of the biodisel which costs about 20 per cent more than the discounted diesel farmers are allowed to buy.

Despite its ecological and culinary attributes, duck fat has its downside, according to one skeptical post in a U.S. online forum on biodiesel.

“Chicken fat is great, duck fat apparently makes cars waddle,” it read.

The post French Duck Fat Puts Gourmet Spin On Biodiesel appeared first on Manitoba Co-operator.

But the oil that British energy giant BP is scrambling to clean up from its massive Gulf of Mexico spill threatens the animals’ grazing land and the income of the ranchers who own them.

Over 1,000 head of cattle graze on marshy islands off Louisiana’s southeast tip and thousands more are found in the coastal low-lying pastures highly susceptible to flooding.

The petroleum and cattle industries have managed to coexist over the years. But now, ranchers fear a hurricane in this watery southeastern area of the state could wash the oil onto grazing land, poisoning their livestock and ruining their value.

“We don’t have a clue what this oil will do,” said Robert Joyner, who heads the Louisiana Cattlemen’s Association. “It’s a whole ’nother ball game.”

Louisiana is home to about 450,000 head of cattle valued last year at $365 million. But the best pasture land is in the coastal south, where cattle can graze year round.

Even before the oil spill it was a challenge being a cattleman here, where many animals can only be moved by barge. Calves succumb to alligators and snake bites, corrals need constant maintenance amid the quick-growing vegetation, and erosion and rising water levels steal valuable pasture every year. And then there are the hurricanes.

Hurricane Katrina in 2005 killed 1,800 of Earl Armstrong’s cattle. The next hurricane could pack a double wallop, with the additional danger of toxins brought ashore.

“I’m not being happy with the oil right now,” said Armstrong, whose cattle graze at the mouth of the Mississippi River, not far from the oil spill cleanup’s command centre. “I don’t know when it’s going to come in on that cattle where they have to eat that grass. It’s a wait-and-see deal.”

Ranchers see themselves ending up last on BP’s compensation list after the oystermen, shrimpers and others who have lost their livelihoods due to the spill are taken care of under BP’s $20-billion fund.

“They want to know if there is a state or federal program to reimburse them for the losses and the answer now is no,” said Dr. Mike Strain, the state’s commissioner of agriculture and forestry.

OIL AND CATTLE DON’T MIX

Early this month, Strain’s agency warned coastal cattle producers that their livestock would not be allowed to go to slaughter if oil contaminates inland pastures.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food Safety and Inspection Service is estimating exposure levels to dangerous chemicals if oil washes ashore and identifying appropriate tests, said FSIS spokesman Brian Mabry.

The average cow here is worth about $1,000, but it would cost about double that to transport and incinerate any deemed unfit for the food supply chain, said Strain.

That means ranchers are scrambling to plan for a sudden evacuation of cattle ahead of a hurricane.

Cattle ranchers from areas unaffected by a hurricane have volunteered to bring trucks and trailers to help in transport, Joyner said, but finding a place to put the relocated cattle is one of a number of problems to be dealt with.

But cattlemen here are loath to transport their animals unnecessarily, given the difficult logistics and stress to the animals.

“Daddy’s here, boys!” shouts Philip Simmons from his flatboat on the Mississippi, catching a glimpse of two of his Brangus bulls grazing the native grasses at water’s edge.

Simmons’ family has been grazing cattle for generations on land that’s surrounded by backwater canals, natural bayous and the Mississippi, a watery oasis of mangroves and willows and wildlife like cranes and spoonbills.

“My cattle feed all the way to the water here,” he said, pointing to the bank of a winding canal, where one group gazed out quizzically from under a canopy of trees and high grasses.

“How am I going to get them out?” asked Simmons. “You’d have to get a helicopter to run them out of this grass. And it’s so hot it’ll kill them. So I’m just playing it by ear. Hopefully I’ll come out on the winning end.”

The post Gulf Cattle Ranchers Fear Toxins After Oil Spill – for Aug. 12, 2010 appeared first on Manitoba Co-operator.

But the oil that British energy giant BP is scrambling to clean up from its massive Gulf of Mexico spill threatens the animals’ grazing land and the income of the ranchers who own them.

Over 1,000 head of cattle graze on marshy islands off Louisiana’s southeast tip and thousands more are found in the coastal low-lying pastures highly susceptible to flooding.

The petroleum and cattle industries have managed to coexist over the years. But now, ranchers fear a hurricane in this watery southeastern area of the state could wash the oil onto grazing land, poisoning their livestock and ruining their value.

“We don’t have a clue what this oil will do,” said Robert Joyner, who heads the Louisiana Cattlemen’s Association. “It’s a whole ’nother ball game.”

Louisiana is home to about 450,000 head of cattle valued last year at $365 million. But the best pasture land is in the coastal south, where cattle can graze year round.

Even before the oil spill it was a challenge being a cattleman here, where many animals can only be moved by barge. Calves succumb to alligators and snake bites, corrals need constant maintenance amid the quick-growing vegetation, and erosion and rising water levels steal valuable pasture every year. And then there are the hurricanes.

Hurricane Katrina in 2005 killed 1,800 of Earl Armstrong’s cattle. The next hurricane could pack a double wallop, with the additional danger of toxins brought ashore.

“I’m not being happy with the oil right now,” said Armstrong, whose cattle graze at the mouth of the Mississippi River, not far from the oil spill cleanup’s command centre. “I don’t know when it’s going to come in on that cattle where they have to eat that grass. It’s a wait-and-see deal.”

Ranchers see themselves ending up last on BP’s compensation list after the oystermen, shrimpers and others who have lost their livelihoods due to the spill are taken care of under BP’s $20-billion fund.

“They want to know if there is a state or federal program to reimburse them for the losses and the answer now is no,” said Dr. Mike Strain, the state’s commissioner of agriculture and forestry.

OIL AND CATTLE DON’T MIX

Early this month, Strain’s agency warned coastal cattle producers that their livestock would not be allowed to go to slaughter if oil contaminates inland pastures.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food Safety and Inspection Service is estimating exposure levels to dangerous chemicals if oil washes ashore and identifying appropriate tests, said FSIS spokesman Brian Mabry.

The average cow here is worth about $1,000, but it would cost about double that to transport and incinerate any deemed unfit for the food supply chain, said Strain.

That means ranchers are scrambling to plan for a sudden evacuation of cattle ahead of a hurricane.

Cattle ranchers from areas unaffected by a hurricane have volunteered to bring trucks and trailers to help in transport, Joyner said, but finding a place to put the relocated cattle is one of a number of problems to be dealt with.

But cattlemen here are loath to transport their animals unnecessarily, given the difficult logistics and stress to the animals.

“Daddy’s here, boys!” shouts Philip Simmons from his flatboat on the Mississippi, catching a glimpse of two of his Brangus bulls grazing the native grasses at water’s edge.

Simmons’ family has been grazing cattle for generations on land that’s surrounded by backwater canals, natural bayous and the Mississippi, a watery oasis of mangroves and willows and wildlife like cranes and spoonbills.

“My cattle feed all the way to the water here,” he said, pointing to the bank of a winding canal, where one group gazed out quizzically from under a canopy of trees and high grasses.

“How am I going to get them out?” asked Simmons. “You’d have to get a helicopter to run them out of this grass. And it’s so hot it’ll kill them. So I’m just playing it by ear. Hopefully I’ll come out on the winning end.”

The post Gulf Cattle Ranchers Fear Toxins After Oil Spill – for Aug. 12, 2010 appeared first on Manitoba Co-operator.