Associated
Press reporter Emery P. Dalesidio has written a long feature article about how
Bayer CropSciences and Syngenta are trying to defend neonicitinoid seed
treatments from accusations that they are responsible for killng bees.
The story
that is circulating globally includes a quote from extension worker who says
neonicitinoids do kill bees, but says the company doesn’t know how many.
"I
think the final verdict is still out there" on how large a role neonics
play in bee deaths, said Dominic Reisig of North Carolina State University.
"I
would say clearly there's something there, but is it one percent? Ten percent?
Ninety percent? We don't know."
But the
United States Department of Agriculture recently released its research report
that finds that the more than three dozen “neonics produced by Bayer
CropScience and Syngenta (are) among the chemicals most toxic to bees,” reports
Dalesidio.
“Bayer,
Syngenta and Monsanto - which coats its seeds with neonics - are encouraging
nonprofits, landowners and governments to plant more flowers and other plants
bees need to feed., reports Delesidio.
“Their
representatives are speaking at beekeepers' conferences and visiting
agricultural research universities.”
Besides
inviting visitors to bee centers on its corporate campuses outside Raleigh,
North Carolina, and Monheim, Germany, Bayer offers teachers a downloadable
digital science lesson about bees. A company Twitter feed promotes the benefits
of neonics and studies that refute their link to bee deaths, often using the
hashtag #FeedABee.
A global
agro-chemical trade magazine recently honored Bayer's pro-bees campaign for
what judges said was its effort "to broaden understanding and shift
conversation from blaming solely pesticides towards a multiplicity of
factors."
Critics
say the pesticide companies claim their products aren’t the only problem, so
therefore it isn't a problem," said Massachusetts beekeeper Dick Callahan,
a retired executive with a doctorate in entomology who co-authored a Harvard
study on the effects of neonics on honeybees.
Callahan said
that mites may be the greatest adversary of his honeybees, yet that doesn't
explain why mite-free bumble bees are also disappearing.
Neonics
were a breakthrough because they can be used to coat seeds rather than sprayed.
Bayer
produces three of the world's top five neonic pesticides in a worldwide market
estimated to be worth about $3 billion, with Bayer's two top-selling products
taking about half the market, said Sanjiv Rana, editor-in-chief of Agrow, a
trade publication for the agricultural chemicals industry. Syngenta's
best-selling neonic is worth about $1 billion in annual sales, Rana said.
Becky
Langer, the Bayer CropScience manager for U.S. bee health, denied the company's
four-year-old campaign is related to the company's neonic sales. It grew out of
decades of research on the interaction of chemicals and the crucial
pollinators, she said.
"One
didn't pop up because of the other," said Langer, whose center oversees
bee field research locations in North Carolina, California and Ontario.
She said:
"Bee numbers are actually not declining."
But that
depends how you count. On the one hand, figures from the United Nations Food
and Agriculture Organization and the U.S. Department of Agriculture show there
are more bee colonies now than 30 years ago.
But those
numbers can be deceiving since beekeepers routinely separate a healthy hive
into two, a practice that helps overcome accepted annual losses of about 18
percent.
Losses in
the U.S. the past five years have been especially acute, with reported annual
losses of 30 percent to 45 percent, according to a study authored by
researchers including the University of Maryland's Dennis vanEngelsdorp.
The heavy
death toll continues through the spring and summer, when bee populations are
collecting pollen and should be their healthiest, the study said.
Across Europe
and nearby countries such as Algeria, beekeepers reported 17 percent of
colonies lost last winter, twice that of the previous year.
That has
regulators and retailers zeroing in on neonics. The U.S. Environmental
Protection Agency is working on new risk assessments, and the European Union is
reviewing a two-year-old ban on the biggest-selling neonics from crops during
their flowering stage.
"We're
going to push with every ounce of our energy to get this thing reversed,"
former Syngenta Chief Executive Officer Michael Mack told stock analysts in
February.
Meanwhile,
Bayer and Syngenta are working on new bee-saving products. Syngenta is testing
biological and chemical agents to fight mites and parasites.
Bayer is
working on repellants to keep bees away from pollinating plants until
pesticides lose their killing power, remote sensors for monitoring hive health,
and the latest in a 30-year series of mite-killing treatments.
Work to
develop a new miticide is worthwhile even though the parasites will likely
develop a resistance before long, Bayer CropScience North America CEO Jim Blome
said.
"It's
very difficult to get your investment back that way. In fact, you won't,"
Blome said. "We believe in expanding bee populations."
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