Is Toby Webb of Sustainable Wine Roundtable Stacking the Deck? Former Bayer Consultant Features Discredited Monsanto Industry Rep on Glyphosate Panel

Last year, many wine professionals were shocked when sustainability conference convener Toby Webb invited a widely discredited "nonprofit" group funded by Bayer and Monsanto to a panel. 

The chat section was lively, with wine professionals (including yours truly) disputing the bona fides and opinions of the industry spokesperson who had previously been outed by a number of nonprofit watchdogs as an industry paid "expert." Read what U.S. Right to Know says about Entine and his history of posing as an expert and not as what he is…a chemical industry spokesman.

Mr. Entine is back! And wineries are paying for this! With their sustainability budgets! Why? 

Wineries are supporting a pesticide manufacturer's PR dream team. This should not be tolerated. And I encourage the member wineries to stop Webb from doing this. And possibly to reconsider why he was hired–with no wine industry experience–but with Bayer career history–to run their sustainability group?

While legal cases abound with actual cancer experts from the International Agency for Research on Cancer testifying left and right that glyphosate is carcinogenic and with thousands of people engaged in court cases alleging they got cancer (usually non Hodgkin's lymphoma) from applying this toxic chemical–and winning–why would a sustainability organization need to include a paid chemical industry promoter with no experience in the wine industry to be on such a panel? 

I'm not saying the topic is not worthy of discussion–it is. And I fully support broader discussion. But let's have real experts.

It would appear that Webb is presenting an uncredentialed PR guy, not actual experts, and a PR guy who may in fact be one of Webb's cronies when Webb worked for Bayer. (Bayer is mentioned in his LinkedIn bio as a former client). 

Why is no reputable epidemiologist involved in the panel? There are plenty of them.

Also why no soil scientists who have studied herbicide extensively? Like Professor Robert Kremer, a soil scientist who studied glyphosate for the USDA for 17 years and knows much about its impacts.

Where are the academic experts? Like the Austrian researchers who found glyphosate-treated soils decreased fungal life–essential for healthy soils–by 53 percent?

Why indeed?

It's up to the member wineries to protect the brand of Webb's enterprise for their own sake, so what wineries are protesting this kind of lopsided panel?

Entine's 2022 appearance makes his THIRD appearance under Webb's wine industry events.

I spoke with one member of the roundtable earlier this year about my concerns and was assured by this person that Webb was a reputable, unbiased expert. I beg to differ. 

Here Webb's April 2021 apology for Roundup, featuring Entine, here. (This is when I first became alarmed about Webb's integrity and that of the groups he has formed and gets paid by). 

And hear about the real source of Entine's funding and mission here.

I would say if you're going to have Entine on–fine. But why don't you also have the journalist who covered the Monsanto trials (and helped expose Entine to the media) Carey Gillam, too? Or Chris Portier, a now retired senior health official from the US federal government and an expert on Roundup? 

We need good discussion and debate on these important topics, but they need to listen to ALL the experts and not keep the wine industry living in an echo chamber of the agrochemical industry. 

And yes, I know there is ONE organic vineyard expert on the program from Argentina. But he is not an academic expert on this topic–and there are plenty of people who are.

One also wonders–is there an advisory group overusing these panels and the selection of the participants? Who is approving these panelists?