clothianidin Archives

clothianidin

April 30, 2024

Despite ban, EPA grants ’emergency’ approval for bee-killing insecticide for 10th straight year

By Johnathan Hettinger

US regulators have approved the emergency use of clothianidin on Florida citrus trees for the tenth straight year, once again allowing farmers to use the insecticide despite its known risk to endangered species and pollinators critical to the health of the food supply.

Since 2015, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has had a moratorium on new uses of neonicotinoid insecticides, including clothianidin, because of evidence that the class of pesticides is linked to pollinator decline. Neonics have been shown to be particularly harmful to bees, which help pollinate important crops, such as vegetables, nuts, cotton and more.

In a 2023 analysis, the EPA found that clothianidin and other neonics are driving hundreds of species protected under the Endangered Species Act toward extinction. Neonics are banned in Europe, and the EU has proposed essentially banning clothianidin on crops imported into the EU.

Despite the concerns, the EPA has continually allowed farmers in Florida to drench the soil surrounding citrus trees with clothianidin to help fight an insect called Asian citrus psyllid, which spreads a disease the industry calls “citrus greening.” The EPA renewed that exemption last week. Florida’s citrus production has seen a steep decline over the last 20 years due largely to the dreaded disease.

“It is the no. 1 issue in citrus, probably in the world,” said Lauren Diepenbrock, an assistant professor & citrus entomology extension specialist at the University of Florida. In the past 20 years, Florida citrus production declined from 300 million boxes in 2003-04 to under 20 million boxes in 2022-23.

February 22, 2023

Citing birds and bees, groups petition EPA to close pesticide loophole

By Carey Gillam

The US should overhaul regulation of a class of insecticides tied to excessive honeybee and bird deaths, according to a citizen petition filed Wednesday with the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) by a coalition of more than 60 nonprofit groups.

Specifically, the groups are demanding the EPA revoke a nearly 40-year-old waiver that allows pesticide companies to bring their products to market without first providing data that proves the product benefits. The groups say the waiver dates back to a 1984 EPA declaration that stated: “rather than require efficacy data the Agency presumes that benefits exceed risks”.

The petition, which was submitted by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER) and the American Bird Conservancy, is aimed at turning back the use of insecticides known as neonicotinoids, or neonics, which many studies have shown to be exceptionally harmful to hundreds of species.

Environmental advocates say numerous studies show neonics are not necessary and are so detrimental to the environment that they should be banned.

“This stuff is causing all sorts of environmental problems and the environmental tragedy is multiplied because in many cases these insecticides provide farmers no benefit but at the same time they’re doing all this damage,” said Peter Jenkins, a lawyer with PEER.

The European Union has banned the outdoor use of certain types of neonics, and the United Nations has said neonics are so hazardous that they should be “severely” restricted. But in the US, the pesticides remain widely used, typically as coatings on corn and soybean seeds planted by farmers to protect crops from insects and disease. Neonicotinoids are used across on an estimated 150m acres of US farmland annually.

When used as seed coatings, neonics are absorbed through the roots of plants as they grow. Residues of the chemicals can persist for years in the environment and are blamed, along with other pesticides, for a so-called “insect apocalypse.”