Beleid en debat

Evidence that neonicotinoids are a strong contributor to insect declines should not come as a surprise. Their use has exploded in the last two decades. As early as 2008, the USEPA in one of its reviews of thiamethoxam went as far as to predict “structural and functional changes of both the aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems” following registration of the insecticide. Such a broad statement of concern is rarely encountered in a formal regulatory assessment. It is unfortunate indeed that this EPA scientist’s views fell on deaf ears.

In a corner of Hertfordshire, in one of the oldest agricultural research institutes in the world – the Rothamsted Research Institute, founded in 1843 – entomologist Chris Shortall spends his days counting and categorising mounds of moths, aphids and beetles. In fact, that is exactly what he has been doing ever since he joined the Rothamsted Insect Survey (RIS) in 2003 – a branch of the Rothamsted Institute that has been dedicated to the tracking and study of all types of bugs in the UK since 1964.

There has been a recent investigation here on Bellingcat, of a poisoning incident in Bulgaria in April 2015, where an individual named Emilian Gebrev was posioned. An angle of this investigation has been to see if it is at all connected to the attempted murder of Sergei Skripal. One particular aspect of recent publicity has been to examine whether or not a “Novichok” series nerve agent was responsible for the 2015 poisoning incident.

A new peer-reviewed study shows that eating a completely organic diet—even for just one week—can dramatically reduce the presence of pesticide levels in people, a finding that was characterized as “groundbreaking” by critics of an industrial food system that relies heavily on synthetic toxins and chemicals to grow crops and raise livestock. Published in the Environmental Research, the study—titled Organic Diet Intervention Significantly Reduces Urinary Pesticide Levels in U.S.

Yet again, our government scientists—the oft neglected but so important brain trust of our Nation—bring the public some very important new data. Pesticide water monitoring experts at the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) paired up with scientists from the University of Iowa in a federally-funded collaboration to track neonicotinoid pesticides or “neonics” in tap water, including the potential to form chlorinated disinfection byproducts (DBPs) from the pesticides and their metabolites that may be more toxic than the original compounds. And, the news isn’t good.

Residue data for seven neonicotinoid pesticides collected between 1999 and 2015 by the US Department of Agriculture’s Pesticide Data Program (PDP) were collated and summarized by year across various food commodities, including fruit, vegetable, meat, dairy, grain, honey, and baby food, as well as water to qualitatively describe and examine trends in contamination frequency and residue concentrations. The highest detection frequencies (DFs) for neonicotinoids by year on all commodities were generally below 20%.

Occurrence and distribution of five neonicotinoids (NEOs) in surface water and sediment were studied in the Pearl Rivers, including three trunk streams, Dongjiang, Beijiang, Xijiang River (DR, BR and XR), South China. At least one neonicotinoid was detected in surface water and sediment of the Pearl Rivers, with imidacloprid (IMI) and thiamethoxam (THM) being the frequently detected NEOs. Total amount of NEOs (∑5neonics) in surface water and sediment ranged from 24.0 to 322 ng/L, and from 0.11 to 11.6 ng/g dw, respectively.