Review of Bee Health

More Danger Signals for Farmers at the EPA

December 3, 2014

From: Roll Call Commentary

By John R. Block

For years now, farmers have been trying to fend off an EPA rule that would treat everything from run-off ditches to farm sloughs as “waters of the U.S.” under the Clean Water Act, hog-tying farmers in miles of red tape and allowing the agency to micromanage almost every action we take on the farm.

Now the EPA is preparing another startling regulatory overreach that could be just as damaging. While they haven’t announced it yet, every indication suggests the agency will soon impose new rules that ban certain uses of some of the most important crop protection products we rely on.

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Until now, the EPA has been sticking to the science: the number one cause of bee problems it says is the parasitic varroa mite. Good science doesn’t support the contention that neonics are to blame. In fact, two pre-eminent Canadian researchers, Cynthia Scott-Dupree and Chris Cutler, have just published the results of the largest-ever field study on neonics and bees.  A million-dollar study, done in consultation with the EPA and performed at the highest standards, called Good Laboratory Practices,  it completely exonerates neonics. It confirms what other field studies and real world evidence demonstrates — that bees actually thrive in crops, such as canola, that are seed-treated with neonics.

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