Beleid en debat

A new study appears to have confirmed suspicions that the neonicotinoid group of pesticides is in part responsible for the dramatic decline in UK honeybee numbers, the Telegraph reports. Insect research charity Buglife and the Soil Association "brought together a number of peer-reviewed pieces of research" which demonstrate that neonicotinoids "damage the health and life cycle of bees over the long term by affecting the nervous system". Matt Shardlow, Buglife chief exec, said: “Other countries have already introduced bans to prevent neonicotinoids from harming bees. This is the most comprehensive review of the scientific evidence yet and it has revealed the disturbing amount of damage these poisons can cause." Peter Melchett, director of the Soil Association, added: “The UK is notorious for taking the most relaxed approach to pesticide safety in the EU. Buglife’s report shows that this puts at risk pollination services vital for UK agriculture."

Despite widespread concern about declines in pollination services, little is known about the patterns of change in most pollinator assemblages. By studying bee and hoverfly assemblages in Britain and the Netherlands, we found evidence of declines (pre-versus post-1980) in local bee diversity in both countries; however, divergent trends were observed in hoverflies. Depending on the assemblage and location, pollinator declines were most frequent in habitat and flower specialists, in univoltine species, and/or in nonmigrants. In conjunction with this evidence, outcrossing plant species that are reliant on the declining pollinators have themselves declined relative to other plant species. Taken together, these findings strongly suggest a causal connection between local extinctions of functionally linked plant and pollinator species.

The evidence provided by the Dutch Water Boards on imidacloprid contamination of surface water (attached) indicates that, in any case in the western part of the Netherlands, high concentrations of imidacloprid are diffused through the environment, which may kill or debilitate insects and possibly other arthropods. Attached is a map of Holland showing the agricultural areas where the use of imidacloprid is permitted.

The use of imidacloprid in Dutch agriculture rose from 668 kg on 5,335 hectares in 1995 to 6, 377 kg on 40,007 hectares in 2004 . Since 2004 major contamination of Dutch surface water with imidacloprid has been detected by the Water Boards, particularly in the western part of the country. The highest concentration was measured in Noordwijkerhout in December 2005: 320,000 ng/L. The maximum permissible limit for imidacloprid in Dutch surface water is 67 ng/L. Imidacloprid is stable to breakdown by water at neutral pH and degrades with a half-life of 355 days in more basic solutions.

England's bees are vanishing faster than anywhere else in Europe, with more than half of hives dying out over the last 20 years, according to a new study.

In a Europe-wide study in eight West and East European countries negative effects of agricultural intensification were observed on wild plant, carabid and bird species diversity. Of the 13 components of intensification measured, use of insecticides and fungicides had consistent negative effects on biodiversity.