Bayer's settlement of Roundup lawsuits unlikely to have signficant impact

Bayer, which owns Monsanto, has agreed to pay up to $10.9 billion ($15.8 billion) to settle tens of thousands of claims in the US alleging it causes cancer.

Bayer will continue selling its weed killer in Australia and fight local litigation against the product.

But University of Sydney Professor of Law Dr Peter Cashman said despite the mounting evidence Roundup was harmful to human health, there were significant differences between the American and Australian justice systems.

"I guess the correlation is clear cut in the sense that it's the same product and same allegations that it causes cancer," Dr Cashman said.

"Overall the fact the company is prepared to settle in the US may be very encouraging to the Australian claimants but there are some reservations that need to be borne in mind."

He said the rules governing class actions differed from America to Australia and Bayer was appealing some of the US decisions.

But he said Bayer's claims that Roundup did not cause cancer, and there was nothing wrong with the product, needed to be taken "with a grain of salt.

"There is epidemiological and other evidence emerging to make it easier to show that the product does cause significant problems for human health. To continue to claim there is no evidence of harm is quite worrying," he said.

He said while the US decision was encouraging, "I wouldn't hold my breath that the company is going to admit liability".

A spokesman for one of the Victorian law firms bringing a class action in the Federal Court, agreed.

"While the US settlement is a welcome development it has no direct bearing on the Australian Roundup class action as Bayer has not admitted liability," Maurice Blackburn spokesman Paddy Murphy said.

Bayer has said the US settlement has no bearing on the glyphosate proceedings in Australia.

At least two class actions have been launched against Roundup in Australia, the first led by a Melbourne gardener who blamed his non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, diagnosed in 2011, on Roundup.

The class actions allege Roundup, formerly made by Monsanto, a company which Bayer acquired in 2018, is unsafe and that label instructions failed to provide an appropriate warning for users.

Mr Murphy said three cases had been transferred from the Supreme Court, to the Federal Court, to be managed by the same judge.

Victorian Farmers Federation grains group president Ashley Fraser said he had not heard many concerns, from local primary producers about the cases.

"The judicial system is very different, in the US, to what it is here," Mr Fraser said.

"In Australia we base our chemical regulations on science and fact, and it's important we maintain that stance here.

"We have good faith in the regulatory oversight of chemicals in Australia."

The next court date is a case management hearing on August 13.

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