Tag Archives: neonicotinoids

‘Landmark Victory’: New York Passes Nation’s First Legislation Restricting Bee-Killing Pesticides

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The Birds and Bees Protection Act would eliminate 80 to 90% of the neonics used in New York each year by banning applications that are either easily replaceable or do not give an economic boost to farmers.

By Olivia Rosane. Published 6-10-2023 by Common Dreams

Common eastern bumblebee, bombus impatiens, covered in pollen on a flower. Photo: Christa R./Flickr

New York state on Friday became the first state in the nation to pass legislation restricting neonicotinoid pesticides (neonics) that are toxic to bees and other pollinators and wildlife.

The Birds and Bees Protection Act would eliminate 80 to 90% of the neonics used in New York each year by banning applications that are either easily replaceable or do not give an economic boost to farmers.

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EPA Sued Over Failure to Regulate Neonic-Coated Seeds Harmful to Bees and Songbirds

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“For too long, EPA has allowed pesticide-coated seeds to jeopardize threatened and endangered species across the country,” said one advocate.

By Julia Conley. Published 6-2-2023 by Common Dreams

Oilseed rape fields are sprayed with neonicotinoids. (Photo: Chafer Machinery/flickr/cc)

Two public health groups filed a lawsuit against the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on Thursday, demanding that the agency close a regulatory loophole that has allowed insecticide-coated seeds to proliferate across 150 million acres of cropland in the United States.

The Center for Food Safety (CFS) and the Pesticide Action Network North America (PANNA) are co-plaintiffs in the lawsuit filed in the U.S. District Court in the Northern District of California, which pertains to seeds coated in neonicotinoids, often called neonics.

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EPA Report on Neonics Proves US Has ‘Five-Alarm Fire’ on Its Hands, Green Groups Say

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“There’s now no question that neonicotinoids play an outsized role in our heartbreaking extinction crisis,” said one advocate. The EPA must “ban these pesticides so future generations don’t live in a world without bees and butterflies and the plants that depend on them.”

By Kenny Stancil. Published 5-5-2023 by Common Dreams

Research has shown that a “serious reduction in pesticide usage” is essential to prevent the extinction of up to 41% of the world’s insects in the coming decades. Photo: Charles J Sharp/Wikimedia Commons/CC

A newly published assessment from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency warns that three of the most commonly used neonicotinoid insecticides threaten the continued existence of more than 200 endangered plant and animal species.

“The EPA’s analysis shows we’ve got a five-alarm fire on our hands, and there’s now no question that neonicotinoids play an outsized role in our heartbreaking extinction crisis,” Lori Ann Burd, environmental health director at the Center for Biological Diversity (CBD), said Friday in a statement.

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Amid Broader Concerns Over Biden USDA Nominee, Watchdog Flags ‘Disturbing Suppression’ of Science by Vilsack

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“Unless he pledges to implement significant safeguards for scientists, Tom Vilsack should not be confirmed. The days in which federal agencies function as scientific gulags should be behind us.”

By Jake Johnson, staff writer for Common Dreams. Published 1-29-2021

Tom Vilsack during the 2008 transition. Photo: Obama Biden Transition Project/CC

On top of concerns about his close industry ties, corporate-friendly policy record, and alarming civil rights history, President Joe Biden’s Agriculture Secretary nominee Tom Vilsack is also facing scrutiny over what one watchdog organization on Friday characterized as “disturbing” evidence that he improperly meddled in and suppressed scientific research during his previous tenure as head of USDA.

Throughout his nearly eight years as former President Barack Obama’s USDA chief, Vilsack “routinely interfered with scientific work that big agriculture found bothersome,” the advocacy group Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER) alleged in a statement Friday, pointing to the direct testimony and survey responses of department scientists. Continue reading →

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‘An Insult to Our National Wildlife’: Trump Reverses Ban on GMOs and Bee-Killing Pesticides in Refuges

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“Industrial agriculture has no place on public lands dedicated to conservation of biological diversity and the protection of our most vulnerable species.”

By Jessica Corbett, staff writer for Common Dreams. Published 8-3-2018

The Trump adminstration just reversed a ban on using bee-poisoning pesticides in wildlife refuges. (Photo: Amy Whitehead/Flickr/cc)

While regulators in other regions of the world have recently worked to ban bee-poisoning pesticides called neonicotinoids that scientists have long warned could cause an “ecological armageddon,” the Trump administration just reversed an Obama-era policy that had outlawed the use of neonics and genetically modified crops in the nation’s wildlife refuges.

Defenders of Wildlife CEO and president Jamie Rappaport Clark, who served as director of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) during the Clinton administration, called the move “an insult to our national wildlife refuges and the wildlife that rely on them.” Continue reading →

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Whistleblower Accuses USDA of Censorship Over Anti-Pesticide Reports

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‘Bureaucracies under political pressure from corporate stakeholders routinely shoot the messenger, even if they are wearing a lab coat.’

By Nadia Prupis, staff writer for Common Dreams. Published 10-29-2015

A USDA researcher says he was censored and punished for reporting on the harmful effects of pesticides like clothianidin. (Photo: jetsandzeppelins/flickr/cc)

A USDA researcher says he was censored and punished for reporting on the harmful effects of pesticides like clothianidin. (Photo: jetsandzeppelins/flickr/cc)

A top scientist with the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) filed a whistleblower complaint Wednesday that accuses the agency of harassment and retaliation for his work showing harmful effects on monarch butterflies from a class of widely used insecticides know as neonicotinoids, or neonics.

The department reportedly imposed a 14-day suspension (pdf) on Dr. Jonathan Lundgren, a senior research entomologist at the USDA, for publishing an unapproved report manuscript in a science journal on the “non-target effects” of a widely used neonic strain and for travel violations ahead of a presentation on the results to a scientific panel. Continue reading →

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