The popular herbicide glyphosate is unlikely to cause cancer, according to a study by the United Nations (U.N.) joint Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and World Health Organization (WHO) committee released last week.

Glyphosate specifically inhibits an enzyme that is essential to plant growth; this enzyme is not found in humans or animals, contributing to the low risk to human and animal health when using glyphosate-based products according to label directions.

The Joint FAO/WHO Meeting on  Pesticide Residues (JMPR) concluded that glyphosate presents a very low acute toxicity and is unlikely to pose a carcinogenic risk to humans from exposure through the diet.

This news from the JMPR comes after much unfortunate and unwarranted confusion continues to be caused by Iternational Agency for Research on Cancer’s (IARC) reclassification of glyphosate last year.

“Glyphosate has a 40-year track record of completely safe use in American fields, and we’ve been able to make great strides in reducing herbicide use in a sustainable manner during this period,” past American Soybean Association (ASA) President Wade Cowan said in a statement last March. “We are concerned about this issue because, while we are businessmen and women, we are also neighbors and members of our community. We depend on tools like glyphosate and other herbicides that have been proven absolutely safe by the world’s leading scientific and regulatory bodies. And because after all, we don’t just farm our land, we live on it, and work alongside our own families in the fields on which we use these products.”

The JMPR’s conclusion is consistent with the overwhelming consensus of regulatory authorities around the world and builds on the recent science-based conclusions by the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) and the Canadian Pest Management Regulatory Authority (PMRA).

In addition, the October 2015 report of the U.S. EPA’s Cancer Assessment Review Committee also concluded that glyphosate is classified as “Not Likely to be Carcinogenic to Humans.”

Glyphosate has a long history of safe use. In evaluations spanning four decades, the overwhelming conclusion of experts worldwide has been that glyphosate, when used according to label directions, does not present an unreasonable risk of adverse effects to humans, wildlife or the environment.