The Federal Trade Commission is opening a 30-day comment period Tuesday on its conditions for Elanco Animal Health’s $7.6 billion purchase of Bayer Animal Health, paving the way for final approval of the deal.

Bayer and attorneys for a proposed class of potential future Roundup plaintiffs will go back to the drawing board after a federal judge expressed skepticism over the legality and fairness of their proposed settlement.

Bayer touted its settlement of most of the current claims from plaintiffs alleging exposure to Roundup caused their Non-Hodgkin lymphoma, but thousands of cases are still waiting in the wings.

Officials with ag chemical giant Bayer say they are standing behind the safety of Roundup and dicamba herbicides despite a massive $11.3 billion settlement of litigation over the products. Bayer CEO Werner Baumann also says the agreement with law firms representing nearly 100,000 Roundup plaintiffs and an undetermined number of dicamba plaintiffs should allay growers’ concerns about access to the herbicides..

Bayer has announced “a series of agreements that will substantially resolve major outstanding Monsanto litigation,” including payments of up to $10.9 billion to settle current and future Roundup claims against the company and $400 million to settle dicamba drift damage complaints.

It’s National Pollinator Week, (June 22-28) and a good time to look at what’s happening in the pollinator world.

A Virginia lawyer who was heavily involved in Roundup litigation before being fired in 2019 by his law firm has pleaded guilty to trying to extort $200 million from an unnamed chemical company.

Bayer’s supervisory board is due to discuss and vote in the next few days on a settlement of thousands of claims by plaintiffs that exposure to Roundup caused their cancer, a German business publication reported Tuesday.

The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has denied a request by plaintiffs in the dicamba litigation to enforce its June 3 order and halt the use of three herbicides this growing season.