Authorisation of banned neonicotinoids - The Wildlife Trusts briefing - January 2024

Authorisation of banned neonicotinoids The Wildlife Trusts briefing - January 2024 Use of bee-killing pesticides in agriculture The Wildlife Trusts strongly oppose the UK Government’s repeated decision to allow emergency use of toxic neonicotinoid pesticides On 18th January 2024, the UK Government authorised the use of Cruiser SB for the treatment of sugar beet seed in 2024, following an applicati. [...] The Government has ignored independent advice from the Expert Committee on Pesticides and approved the use of this harmful chemical on our fields for the fourth year in a row– regardless of an industry commitment to end reliance on the banned pesticide in 2023. [...] Why is this a bad decision? Authorising the use of neonicotinoids puts our natural environment at dramatic risk and flies in the face of both expert advice and the UK’s international commitments, such as the COP15 commitment to reduce the risk from pesticides and highly hazardous chemicals by at least half by 2030. [...] Both the Expert Committee on Pesticides (ECP) and the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) object to the authorisation of Cruiser SB, having concluded that the potential risk to bees and other pollinators outweighs the benefits of granting the authorisation. [...] Without thriving populations of pollinators in the UK, we will struggle to halt the decline of wildlife more broadly, leaving us unable to harness nature’s ability to adapt and mitigate the impacts of climate Buff-tailed bumble bee nectaring in a flower-rich field margin change.