Neonicotinoid pesticide ban suspended

Quite depressing: http://www.theguardian.com/environm...pends-ban-pesticides-linked-serious-harm-bees

'Ministers have not made public the information provided by the NFU, citing commercial confidentiality.'

'(Defra) also told its expert committee on pesticides (ECP) to halt its normal practice of publishing the minutes of meetings at which the neonicotinoid applications were discussed'

 

Below from my beekeeping Society:

Breaking news: an hour ago, environment minister Liz Truss snuck out a last-minute decision to allow the use of bee-killing pesticides on UK fields. [1]

It’s not good news, but thanks to enormous pressure from 38 Degrees members over the past few months, the approval is for a much smaller area than originally planned. [2] By allowing the use of bee-killing pesticides, the government is going against it’s own experts and almost half a million 38 Degrees members. [3]

Today’s been a big, surprising setback in our campaign to protect our bees. But we don’t have to stop here. We could talk to experts about whether we can appeal this decision. Or perhaps we should find out where the bee-killing pesticides are going to be used and launch local campaigns against them?

We make the best decisions when we work together. Can you help decide what we do now?
https://secure.38degrees.org.uk/bees-what-next

The process around this decision was a total mess. The government gagged their own experts from speaking publicly - after they initially said no to letting bee-killing pesticides back on UK fields. [3] And then ministers made the final decision behind closed doors on the last day before MPs go on holiday for six weeks. [4]

The petition to keep the ban on bee-killing pesticides has an incredible 473,000 signatures. And thousands of 38 Degrees members sent tweets, called and emailed the Defra ministers asking them to stand up for our bees. [5]

Our pressure made a difference, the first application to use the toxic pesticides was rejected outright. [6] Sadly the second one was approved, but for a much smaller area. So what should we do now?

Should we embarrass the government for making this dodgy decision by taking out adverts in newspapers? Or perhaps we should move on to other campaigns?

Please help us decide what to do next by taking this short survey:
https://secure.38degrees.org.uk/bees-what-next


Thanks for everything you do,

Nat, Robin, Maddy, the whole 38 Degrees team and the bees


[1] Farmers Guardian: NFU granted Autumn Emergency Use Neonicotinoid Derogation:
http://www.fginsight.com/news/nfu-granted-autumn-emergency-use-neonicotinoid-derogation-4968
[2] Farmers Weekly: Neonicotinoid emergency use approved for 5% of OSR area:
http://www.fwi.co.uk/arable/neonicotinoid-emergency-use-approved-for-five-of-osr-area.htm
[3] The Guardian: UK government gags advisers in bees and pesticides row:
http://www.theguardian.com/environm...rs-refusal-support-bee-harming-neonicotinoids
[4] Parliament UK: House of Commons recess dates:
http://www.parliament.uk/about/faqs/house-of-commons-faqs/business-faq-page/recess-dates/
[5] 38 Degrees Blog: Breaking news - Bees:
http://home.38degrees.org.uk/2015/07/03/breaking-news-bees/
38 Degrees Blog: 435,000 say save bees:
http://home.38degrees.org.uk/2015/07/07/435000-say-save-bees/[6] Farmers Guardian: NFU Neonicotinoid Emergency Use Application Rejected:
http://www.fginsight.com/news/nfu-neonicotinoid-emergency-use-application-rejected-4555

 

Typical of a party which is in the pockets of the Agro-chemical industry.

 

Hope you do not mind Spruce,. but I copied your excellent piece on to another site for a wider audience to read.

 

More than happy as I copied it from what my bee society sent me and I did ask and he was more than happy to add to GC .

 

Not quite sure what is going on regarding pesticides.
I think most, used in the past have always been capable of killing bees?

But the old ones appear to have been banned and now the newer ones are being blamed for killing off the bees?

As I say, something does not make sense to me and I'm slightly sceptical the bee problem is totally down to pesticides.

But then I'm no scientist, just looking at the bigger picture, I hope, as without pesticides there would be a lot of hungry people out there.
The populations of most developed countries are completely out of step with what the land can provide by totally natural means.

 

One thing that i've seen in my days is that some times things don't get done properly in the first place, then it's has to be done again, with some chemicals you can't use again in the same harvest year

 

https://www.foe.co.uk/page/the-bee-cause-act

 

I think the problem also lies with the fact that the public have mostly concreted over their gardens and any greenery left is mainly lawn and shrubs.
Public parks are devoid of flowers and areas set aside for nature consist mainly of wild grasses and weeds with next to no flowers.
And of course its very easy to blame the farmers for all the worlds ills but at the same time we all want relatively cheap food in the supermarkets.

 

Ugh! Just saw a toad in my garden! (Don't even have a water feature/outlet but I understand they only need water for breeding). They seem so ugly and the way they awkwardly walk is somewhat repugnant to me. Still they have their uses e.g. eating slugs and snails so I guess I should be grapefruit!

(No doubt there will be a stream of posts now from those who love toads).

 

Love toads.
Basically I like all wildlife, but there are those that hate chemicals and blame them for all the problems and those that use chemicals at the expense of all wildlife.

I'm kind of in the middle.

 

I see this is old news now, but I missed that the ban was being lifted/not lifted. I used to work on bumblebees (hence my user name) and published a research article in Science in 2012 looking at neonics.
I don't necessarily think that banning them was/is the way forward to be honest; its maybe the safest thing to do in the short term, but what we need is a really well considered system for trialling the effects of all these chemicals. There is a good chance that the increased use of other chemicals will hurt the environment as much or more than neonics.

Either way, I am sure that the way policies are made at the moment:
Pressure groups vs government vs farmers vs scientists vs chemical companies (all siding with whoever best suits at the time) don't make for good policies.