Pollinators and Pesticides What's New?



Background

If anyone needs evidence of the extremely urgent need to stop hazardous pesticide use, just have them read about the disappearance of the bees. Yes, this crisis is a complex issue, but a little digging on the issue brings us directly to the fact that our pesticide policies do not adequately protect sensitive species, with bees at the top of the list.
 
Colony Collapse Disorder

The crisis of colony collapse disorder (CCD) in the honeybee population is an increasingly widespread phenomenon of bees disappearing or abandoning their hives. There are, of course, numerous theories that involve pesticides, viruses, and pathogens. Bayer CropScience, the manufacturer of one of the implicated pesticides, imidacloprid and clothianidin, dismisses the pesticide connection. But countries, including France, Germany and Italy, have taken steps to limit their use, along with other pesticides like fipronil. The National Union of French Beekeepers brought the problem to national attention on and forced their government to restrict these pesticides. The U.S. lags behind, outside the glare of public outrage and protests that have been seen in Europe. The pesticide link to bee poisonings is not new. And, the lack of an adequate regulatory response is as old as our 1972 federal pesticide law and all its revisions. What we are seeing today is an escalation of a problem that has been building for decades. Bees support our environment, pollinating half the flowering plant ecosystem and one-third of agricultural plants.

Problems Escalate Under Risk Assessment Standards

The disappearance of the bees alerts us to a fundamental and systemic flaw in our approach to the use of toxic chemicals –and highlights the question as to whether our risk assessment approach to regulation will slowly but surely cause our demise without a meaningful change of course. Michael Schacker, the author of A Spring Without Bees: How Colony Collapse Disorder Has Endangered Our Food Supply, identifies humans’ anthropocentric world view as justifying our manipulation of nature to the brink of destruction. The bees should serve as a warning because our very existence depends on theirs. The bee problem, which is not new just more frightening than it has ever been, should be a wake-up call. It should force a rethinking of how we approach policies that allow the management of “pests” with a war-like mentality and the continued use of chemicals for which there are safe alternatives. While admittedly uncertain and filled with deficiencies, risk assessments establish unsupported thresholds of acceptable chemical contamination of the ecosystem, despite the availability of non-toxic alternative practices and products. In fact, the only acceptable policies in this crisis are those that eliminate toxic pesticide use. The only acceptable legislative reform proposals are those that eliminate unnecessary toxic chemical use. For example, why do we allow chemical-intensive practices in agriculture when organic practices that eliminate the vast majority of hazardous substances are commercially viable? Risk assessments, supported by environmental and public health statutes, in effect prop-up unnecessary poisoning.

Protecting Pollinators from Pesticides: Stopping the demise of honeybees
(2011 National Pesticide Forum)

 

A presentation on protecting honeybees and other pollinators given at "Sustainable Community: Practical solutions for health and the environment, Beyond Pesticides' 29th National Pesticide Forum, April 8-9, 2011, Denver, CO. Speakers: Tom Theobald, owner, Niwot Honey Farms; founder, Boulder County Beekeepers' Association, Niwot, CO; James Frazier, PhD, professor of entomology, Penn State University, University Park, PA; Marygael Meister, president and founder, Denver Beekeepers' Association, Denver, CO.

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