Bee careful: UK garden centers urged to drop popular pesticide to protect honeybees

Reuters/Darren Staples

Reuters/Darren Staples

British garden centers are being urged to withdraw a widely-used bug killer containing thiacloprid – a pesticide belonging to neonicotinoid group. They are controversial as many scientists believe they are contributing to the mass deaths of honeybees.

According to the UK Ethical Consumer magazine, promoting ‘ethical
consumerism’, nine leading garden centers in the UK sell a bug
killer that contains thiacloprid.

Bees are the most important crop pollinators and many species of
the insects have been facing drastic declines in recent years.

In 2013, the European Commission placed restrictions on three
neonicotinoids (imidacloprid, clothianidin and thiamethoxam),
citing worries about their impact on the insects. It said it
would review the situation within two years.

READ MORE: ‘Bee
killer’ pesticide provides little benefit to farmers – EPA

The UK government reluctantly implemented the ban, though its
official position remains that “the
evidence suggests that effects on bees do not normally
occur.”

Thiacloprid is considered to be less toxic to bees than its
banned analogues. Dr. Julian Little, a spokesman for Bayer
CropScience, makers of the product, said the chemical is
“extremely safe to bees when used according to the label
instructions,”
as cited by the Guardian.


READ MORE: Bee studies feel sting of pesticide manufacturers –
MPs

Meanwhile, the authors of the European Academy Science Advisory
Council (EASAC) wrote in a new report published on Wednesday that there
was “an increasing body of evidence” that
neonicotinoids, used in more than 120 countries, have “severe
negative effects on non-target organisms.”


Jean-Charles Bocquet, director-general of the European Crop
Protection Association (ECPA), which represents the pesticide
industry, said in a statement that the new report reflects “a
bias of the anti-neonicotinoid campaign”
which is based on
laboratory tests rather than field studies.

The scientific evidence around how damaging neonicotinoids are
remains a point of contention for agrichemical companies and
activists.

Andrew Pendleton, head of campaigns at Friends of the Earth, an
international network of environmental organizations, believes
that “with almost one in 10 European wild bees facing
extinction and many more under severe threat, we cannot afford to
spray chemicals linked to their decline in our gardens and
parks.”

READ MORE: Pesticides
linked to honeybee decline are affecting other species,
scientists say

Other recent studies also claim that these same chemicals could
be playing a role in the declines of other species as well, such
as butterflies and birds.

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