EU Bans all Pesticides Harmful to Bees

[Bamboo]

The EU has just agreed to ban all pesticides that are harmful to bees. It will come in to force by the end of 2018. Any pesticide use will now be confined to glass houses.
Here is the link to the article.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/apr/27/eu-agrees-total-ban-on-bee-harming-pesticides

Will others follow suit?

[moebees]

The EU has just agreed to ban all pesticides that are harmful to bees. It will come in to force by the end of 2018. Any pesticide use will now be confined to glass houses.
Here is the link to the article.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/apr/27/eu-agrees-total-ban-on-bee-harming-pesticides

Will others follow suit?

Unfortunately this country will not follow suit. 

[Van, Arkansas, USA]

Moe, agreed, unfortunately you are correct.  Big business will buy, er uh, I mean lobby Congress.

[little john]

"EU Bans all Pesticides Harmful to Bees"

That's simply not true - the EU has banned the outdoor use of neonicotinoids - not all insecticides.  The issue now is what substances will be used in place of neonicotinoids ...

I can foresee a helluva lot more spraying than in the recent past.
LJ

[moebees]

"EU Bans all Pesticides Harmful to Bees"

That's simply not true - the EU has banned the outdoor use of neonicotinoids - not all insecticides.  The issue now is what substances will be used in place of neonicotinoids ...

I can foresee a helluva lot more spraying than in the recent past.
LJ

You are correct that the title is not precisely accurate but I'm sure you know that headlines are written by editors. 

I'm not sure it will lead to necessarily more spraying. I assume most of the applications in the EU are like here, that they are applied as seed treatments.   So most of the applications are not even a choice by farmers.  They just get it along with the seed they buy.  Research has shown that seed treatments provide no yield improvement in soybeans.  So they probably won't even notice that they have lost anything.  Even if they go to other pesticides they may not be as sinister as neonicotinoids.  Neonics are some of the most toxic pesticides ever created, they are systemic, and they build up in the soil. They are also water soluble and end up contaminating our waterways. 

Secondly, the recent past has not been a time of little spraying. If they spray anymore they will have time to do nothing else. Contrary to the GMO proponents claims the application of pesticides has increased. Not decreased.

[Bamboo]

"EU Bans all Pesticides Harmful to Bees"

That's simply not true - the EU has banned the outdoor use of neonicotinoids - not all insecticides.  The issue now is what substances will be used in place of neonicotinoids ...

I can foresee a helluva lot more spraying than in the recent past.
LJ

I did say that it was outdoor being that they could only spray in glass houses.
However I still think it is a step in the right direction.
What will they replace it with??? I am sure there will be a bright someone somewhere that will develop something that is not as harmful, let's hope so anyway.

[Acebird]

The real problem is what is the EU?  A whole bunch of independent small countries.  They are not feeding the world, at best they are feeding themselves.  Beekeepers in the EU are still using chemicals in their hives.  So if they want to make a statement stop.  The ban has little effect on the world.

[moebees]

EU regulations govern all those small countries whose population combined is greater than the United States.  The implication that they are not feeding the world is that we are.  Do you know that the U.S is a net food importer. We are not feeding the world either even tho agribusiness blowhards like to talk about that.  And finally the vast majority of the crops being treated with neonicotinoids go to feeding animals. Not feeding people.

[eltalia]

The real problem is what is the EU?  A whole bunch of independent small countries.
 They are not feeding the world, at best they are feeding themselves.  Beekeepers
in the EU are still using chemicals in their hives.  So if they want to make a statement
stop.  The ban has little effect on the world.

Crikey Brian..!.. you do reflect (always) a very narrow view of Planet Earth.
Or is Xenophobia your "thing"?
No personal affrontry here but I do ask have you ever travelled or even
throughly explored Lands and so Cultures beyond your frontgate?

I consume loads of imported Danish pork, 'cos it is 'better' than our own
and I can afford to. Likewise for Panettone, absolutely delicious!
Any improvement from those two countries in building those products
benefits myself-  and family - and so for which I am truly grateful.

Now excuse me whilst I go have lunch and my weekly toddy of fine
'Merkin spiced rye whisky... hoping That is not made from GM grains!

Bill

[little john]

I'm not sure it will lead to necessarily more spraying. I assume most of the applications in the EU are like here, that they are applied as seed treatments. 

Eh ? So you take away this seed treatment (which effectively eliminates several doses of spray) but the problem of destructive pests remains - largely due to their increase which is an inevitable consequence of persistent mono-cropping.  All that will happen now is that one poison will be replaced by another - or several others - by spraying.  What other methods are available ?

The heart of the problem isn't neonicotinoids - it never was - the origins of the problem lie with the fundamental philosophy which underpins industrial agriculture, which in turn is attempting to address the problem of supplying enough food to feed an exponential growth in the human population. 

Too many people on this planet - it's the elephant in the room for which no-one in a position of influence is willing to seek a solution.
LJ

[Bamboo]

Too many people on this planet - it's the elephant in the room for which no-one in a position of influence is willing to seek a solution.
LJ

There is more than enough food on the planet to feed everyone here and then some. We waste approx 30% of all food currently produced. Enough to feed 2 billion people.
Population is not the issue
It is more about distribution and the Wests attitude to food and rejection of anything that is not perfect that is the problem and the waste thereof that is more of a concern.

[Acebird]

Or is Xenophobia your "thing"?

For someone with such a vocabulary how does pesticides, bees, and food relate to hatred of people?  I don't see the point is twisting what others say.

[little john]

Too many people on this planet - it's the elephant in the room for which no-one in a position of influence is willing to seek a solution.
LJ

There is more than enough food on the planet to feed everyone here and then some.

I wonder then why rain forests continue to be destroyed in order to plant food crops ...
I wonder then why other species are being pushed to the brink of extinction ...
I wonder then why marine protection zones are being set up to protect dwindling fish stocks ...

Depleting resources, massive levels of pollution - all caused by having far too many people on this planet.

The world human population reached the first billion mark somewhere around 1800, until 1926 to reach two billion, and another 33 years to reach its third.  It is currently around 6 billion(*); the last three billions have taken 14, 13 and 11 years respectively. By 2050 the UN estimate a world population of around 12 billion.

It took somewhere around 200,000 years for the human population to reach 1 billion - and then only 200 years or so to reach today's figure - and you seriously think that a population problem doesn't exist ?
LJ

(*)These figures were part of my 1997 post-graduate thesis - I've just checked to learn that the figure for the current (2018) global human population is 7.6 billion.

[moebees]

It is currently around 6 billion

Try closer to 7 and 1/2 billion.

[Skeggley]

Here in West Australia certain pesticides have been banned due to the infinite wisdom of the Agricultural Department. Hooray say all the greenies, a huge step forward.
Meanwhile the stone fruit producers here are suffering an 80% loss of crop with many talking about bulldozing the orchards, subdividing and developing.
So, with this shortfall we need to import fruit from over East, who can still use the banned pesticides, or from overseas which use whatever pesticides they're allowed to.
Somehow it's cheaper to buy imported food here, so we do..... And export all our food.. Go figure.

[Acebird]

It blows my mind that we produce half the worlds food be we still import vegetables like tomatoes and peas.  You try to make sense of it.

[BeeMaster2]

Brian,
Our government is paying premium prices for corn so that it can be used for fuel via 50 cent a gallon tax break.  Fields that used to grow a wide range of crops are now growing corn year after year.
Government sticking their noses where it doesn?t belong is the problem. On top of this, it raises the price of corn, the main feed for all live stock. Added together it has raised the price of all food.
Jim

[Dustymunky]

Good news on the ban.  Portland and Eugene has mostly banned neonics. A few states recently banned their use as well. It really sucks that people go to big box hardware stores to buy flowers to ?help the bees? and they could actually be poisoning them.

[Acebird]

Brian,
Our government is paying premium prices for corn so that it can be used for fuel via 50 cent a gallon tax break.
Jim

Yeah I know Jim.  I was going to mention to LJ that it is not so much food that they rip up the rain forest as it is gasoline.  Money; money, money, money.

[Bamboo]

Too many people on this planet - it's the elephant in the room for which no-one in a position of influence is willing to seek a solution.
LJ

There is more than enough food on the planet to feed everyone here and then some.

I wonder then why rain forests continue to be destroyed in order to plant food crops ...
I wonder then why other species are being pushed to the brink of extinction ...
I wonder then why marine protection zones are being set up to protect dwindling fish stocks ...

Depleting resources, massive levels of pollution - all caused by having far too many people on this planet.

The world human population reached the first billion mark somewhere around 1800, until 1926 to reach two billion, and another 33 years to reach its third.  It is currently around 6 billion(*); the last three billions have taken 14, 13 and 11 years respectively. By 2050 the UN estimate a world population of around 12 billion.

It took somewhere around 200,000 years for the human population to reach 1 billion - and then only 200 years or so to reach today's figure - and you seriously think that a population problem doesn't exist ?
LJ

Some of what you say is true however
Rainforests are not being destroyed for food crops they are being destroyed mainly for planting Palm oil crops which is consumed in various forms by the west because it is cheap I would not describe oil as "food"
Species are facing extinction because of that destruction of their habitat because of rampant consumerism by the west.
Marine reserves are necessary because we are destroying the fisheries. The large fishing companies have fish quotas and the quota only applies to the target catch so they dump all the bycatch which is then dead. Undersize fish of the target catch is also dumped which destroys the species.
Oil companies now use seismic blasting to identify possible oil in the ocean, this blasting destroys phytoplankton the very basis of the food chain in the ocean so if we insist on using oil for energy then you can forget about fish on your plate.
It is the waste that is a problem from the sea to the paddock to the supermarket to our fridges. It is our attitude to food, right shape colour, size etc. Use by dates to encourage people to throw out perfectly good food and go buy some more which they then throw out.

Companies, corporations are only interested in one thing...profit they don't give a rats about preserving species or what the future holds, it is today's share price and the dividend paid to the shareholder, fail in that and buddy go find another job. They don't care if they stuff the environment, dispossess traditional land holders, the future is not their concern so long as they can satisfy their stakeholders.

The point is we need collectively to take a wholistic approach to our inhabiting this planet. Will we? I doubt it I think we may have passed the point that we can save it.

So let's just keep spraying, raping the oceans and rainforests and not worry about it cos LJ you and me will be long gone and it won't be our problem will it? sigh..

And we won't hear our descendants say "Why didn't you do something?"

[Acebird]

And we won't hear our descendants say "Why didn't you do something?"

Except, they are part of the problem.  Got to have it NOW.

[eltalia]

Or is Xenophobia your "thing"?

For someone with such a vocabulary how does pesticides, bees, and food relate to h
hatred of people?  I don't see the point is twisting what others say.

When I read you again dismissing whole nations as easily as you do do
forgive me for pausing to think the core of your argument. Thanks for
clarifying your statement.

Yet the response begs yet another anomaly.
Historicly your attitude to what I do post - do note this is waning - often
carries a load of disdain as window dressing, often focused on language (style).
Your response quoted above implies I do own a vocabulary, something of a
mystery as you also claim I babble in incoherant nonparsable gibberish.
Is consistency beyond you Brian?
Or is it only the case we (royal) get to read the effects of adding water to excess
honey stores then used as throat lubrication?

No biggee, just be nice to know your batting style so a fella can run a homer
once in awhile. Heh ;-)

Bill

[eltalia]

"And we won't hear our descendants say "Why didn't you do something?"".

Assuming Mark those descendants well into the future actually communicate one
 on one!
It is amazing today how frightened the younguns are of actually holding a
conversation together, publicly. Heads dive into phones in waiting rooms,
on planes/trains/buses, all over. (sad)

Bill

[Dallasbeek]

"And we won't hear our descendants say "Why didn't you do something?"".

Assuming Mark those descendants well into the future actually communicate one
 on one!
It is amazing today how frightened the younguns are of actually holding a
conversation together, publicly. Heads dive into phones in waiting rooms,
on planes/trains/buses, all over. (sad)

Bill

Really sad to see people in a restautant or theater text each other or someone else while waiting for service or for movie to start.  Especially irritating when two people in row in front of you are text each other throughout a movie. 

[Acebird]

Especially irritating when two people in row in front of you are text each other throughout a movie.

My take on this is the movie sucked and a waste of 20 bucks.

[bemused]

The heart of the problem isn't neonicotinoids - it never was - the origins of the problem lie with the fundamental philosophy which underpins industrial agriculture, which in turn is attempting to address the problem of supplying enough food to feed an exponential growth in the human population. 

It is worth pointing out that the EU isn't banning neonicotinoids, it is restricting the following treatments: imidacloprid, thiamethoxam and clothianidin. There has been a moratorium on the use of these within the EU for almost five years now. I won't pretend to be an expert in the science but to your point honey bee populations within the EU have remained stable for decades; the dramatic drop in unmanaged populations of pollinators more closely matches the regulatory regime of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) introduced in the 1960s than with these treatments that appeared in the 1990s.

CAP, like many other agricultural subsistence programs, incentivises production to the point it is financially viable to farm every square inch of land; in the process decimating habitats that supported native pollinators. Since the early 2000s CAP has begun to reframe itself as an environmental scheme, but it's caused immense damage whilst making multinational farming organisations millions but driving traditional family farms out of business. Within the EU less than 20% of farmers are below 40.

[KeyLargoBees]

The best (and scariest) part of all of this is that the folks who are supporting the ban of neoniconitoids are all young enough to have no memory of what it was like before seed treatments became the norm and aerial crop dusting was all the rage....on the up side the increased need for crop dusting pilots will give military veterans another option for employment post active duty :-)

[Bamboo]

Assuming Mark those descendants well into the future actually communicate one
 on one!
It is amazing today how frightened the younguns are of actually holding a
conversation together, publicly. Heads dive into phones in waiting rooms,
on planes/trains/buses, all over. (sad)

Bill

Yes my daughter did a paper on it at university. Basically they found that the kids have lost the art of holding a conversation. They are unable to quickly formulate ideas and concepts in their head and then verbalise them. They need time to do it and the time taken to type it out even in shorthand on a keyboard gives them that time to be able to coherently communicate those ideas. A group of kids can be sitting across the table from each other but rather than speak they text. Just watch the panic if you take away their phone or they lose it 

Last weekend, Saturday was a stunning day here so we went off to the beach to have lunch by the water and I saw a really sad sight. Next to us was a family of three Mum Dad and a teenaged son. They sat there the whole time each of them texting or browsing on their phones and in 30 mins didn't say one word to each other. It was one of those spectacular days, not a cloud in the sky, 27C and gentle rolling surf on pristine white sand and these guys missed it all!!

[bemused]

The best (and scariest) part of all of this is that the folks who are supporting the ban of neoniconitoids are all young enough to have no memory of what it was like before seed treatments became the norm and aerial crop dusting was all the rage....on the up side the increased need for crop dusting pilots will give military veterans another option for employment post active duty :-)

The EU has painted them into a similar corner with GMO as the USA did with stem cell research. The EU regulate GMO crops to the point where is very difficult to bring a new corp to market. Whilst GMO in this early stage haven't produced the magical pesticide free corp the potential of the technology to ultimately maintain yields with fewer external input are tremendous. While the EU make it more difficult to bring new treatments and GMO to market farmers, incentivized by the EU agricultural regime, will continue to use chemical pesticides at a higher rate.

[Acebird]

Last weekend, Saturday was a stunning day here so we went off to the beach to have lunch by the water and I saw a really sad sight. Next to us was a family of three Mum Dad and a teenaged son. They sat there the whole time each of them texting or browsing on their phones and in 30 mins didn't say one word to each other. It was one of those spectacular days, not a cloud in the sky, 27C and gentle rolling surf on pristine white sand and these guys missed it all!!

The irony is only engineers lakes social skills now the whole world lacks social skill and the blame for that is social media.

[Ben Framed]

Are things noticeably better in Europe for bees (as well as other bugs) since the banning a few years ago?

Phillip