General Mills Cheerios may now be “non-GMO” but it is virtually guaranteed to contain Roundup herbicide residues, as disclosed by North America’s largest oat supplier.

While there are no genetically modified oats on the marketplace today, non-organic oats might as well be labeled Roundup Ready (RR). This is because it is common practice to spray them with Roundup’s active ingredient glyphosate, putting them in the same category of glyphosate contaminated crops which includes RR GM soy, corn and canola.

Why must oats be sprayed? Known as pre-harvest desiccation, glyphosate is sprayed on oat crops right before their harvest, ostensibly to increase product uniformity and yield, and to save time in harvesting.

A report on Washingtonsblog.com explains how Monsanto funded research, which is notoriously biased, is behind this practice:

    “Specifically, Monsanto International published a paper in 2010 touting the application of Roundup to kill crops right before harvest, in order to dry out the crops in advance and produce a more uniform and earlier harvest (starting on page 28):

    “Uneven maturity and green tissue delays harvest. Spraying glyphosate desiccates green foliage & stems. The photograph (below left) shows the uniform dessication of sunflower by the use of glyphosate(Roundup Bioaktiv) applied by helicopter in Hungary (Czepó, 2009a). The photograph (below right) shows complete foliar desiccation of grain maize on the right side 14 days after application of glyphosate (Roundup Bioaktiv) at 0.54kg ae/ ha in 7 0L/ ha applied by helicopter using Reglojet nozzles and including Bandrift Plus at 0.1 % at 34% grain moisture in Hungary, with the untreated visible on the left-hand side.”

Assuming pre-harvest desiccation actually works as Monsanto claims, it should result in lower drying costs, an earlier harvest, and ultimately higher profit. But what is not figured in is the cost to the consumer who is already faced with widespread exposure to a chemical that has already been found in most the water, air, rain samples tested and which may retain serious toxicity at concentrations in as low as parts-per-trillion range?

Most people today consider Roundup herbicide exposure to be a problem linked solely to GMO foods, and not oats. This misperception has been a convenient fact for the non-GMO sector of Big Agra, which continues to use a wide range of highly toxic agrochemicals in food and feed crops that can still legally be described and/or labeled as non-GMO.

But the industry is beginning to be forced to respond to both a powerful shift in consumer awareness and demand in favor of organically produced, non-GMO oat products, as well as to a WHO report released last March that identified glyphosate to be a ‘probable carcinogen.’