Sugar beet farmers have the green light to use a banned pesticide deadly to bees following a forecast that a virus could sweep through their crops.
Emergency authorisation to use neonicotinoids was given in January but rested on a threat level being met.
Supplier British Sugar said the predicted infection rate was now 83% of crop and was “historically high”.
Defra said the decision to approve was not “taken lightly” but campaigners said it made “a mockery” of the ban.
Neonicotinoids are toxic to pollinating bees, disrupting their ability to navigate and reproduce. But some sugar beet farmers say the pesticides are needed to protect against the disease known as virus yellows.
It sucks this is toxic to bees but this beet disease sounds like a legitimate major issue. I’m guessing there aren’t other pesticides that could be used?
I believe there are, but they are worse.
The disease is carried by aphids that are generally killed by hard winters. We are now getting milder, wetter winters due to climate change, so are more and more likely to get high numbers of overwintering aphis surviving.
It seems that things are not ad bad in continental Europe, since although they may be getting warmer winters, they are usually not as wet and so not as good for the aphids in the first place.
Really, you have to wonder whether the UK actually is a sensible place to growing sugarbeet at all now.