By Shannan Stoll, YES! Magazine
http://www.yesmagazine.org/issues/making-it-home/bee-decline-blamed-o...
ewly published scientific evidence is bolstering calls for greater
regulation of some of the world's most widely used pesticides and
genetically modified crops.
Earlier this year, three independent studies linked agricultural
insecticides to colony collapse disorder, a phenomenon that leads honeybees
to abandon their hives.
Beekeepers have reported alarming losses in their hives over the last six
years. The USDA reports the loss in the United States was about 30 percent
in the winter of 2010-2011.
Bees are crucial pollinators in the ecosystem. Their loss also impacts the
estimated $15 billion worth of fruit and vegetable crops that are pollinated
by bees in the United States.
The studies, conducted in the United States, France, and the United Kingdom,
all pointed to neonicotinoids, a class of chemicals used widely in U.S. corn
production, as likely contributors to colony collapse disorder. The findings
challenged the EPA's position - based on studies by Bayer CropScience, a
major producer of the neonicotinoid clothianidin - that bees are only
exposed to small, benign amounts of these insecticides.
