Regulators in Europe and the US decline to impose a ban on neonicotinoids
In the US the systemic neonicotinoids were introduced in 1991 and in the UK in 1994. The percentage of UK cropland treated with neonicotinoids has gone from 0.65% in 1994, to 24.4% in 2008. But the biggest increases have occurred in the last 10 years, from 1 million acres in 2000, to 2.5 million acres in 2008. We have collated a series of replies that we have personally received, or have seen, from the various Environmental Protection Agencies in Europe and the US. Uniformly, they all declined to impose a ban, because of „lack of evidence‟ that bees are being harmed. Attached is an article on the influence of Bayer Cropscience on Dutch policy makers (which appeared in the magazine "Vrij Nederland" on April 4, 2012).