Health Canada on Wednesday announced its special review decisions on the risks to aquatic bug life from the use of clothianidin and thiamethoxam, both pesticides and seed treatments from the neonicotinoid (“neonic”) class.

The health department launched a special review of the neonics in 2016, leading to a 2018 preliminary decision calling for a phased-in ban on outdoor use of the chemicals. However, it said Wednesday it would instead be “updating” some of the products’ registered uses and introducing “additional mitigation measures and restrictions” on uses that remain registered.

Clothianidin is an active ingredient in ag chem products including BASF’s Titan and Poncho, Bayer’s Prosper, Emesto and Sepresto and Valent’s Nipsit, Clutch and Arena. Thiamethoxam, meanwhile, is marketed by Syngenta under brands including Helix, Cruiser and Actara, among others.

For thiamethoxam, Health Canada will cancel the chemical’s uses in soil drench application on potato crops and foliar application on lowbush blueberries. For clothianidin, in-furrow application on potato crops and seed treatment for field-sown leafy vegetables and bunching onion will be cancelled.

Among changes in label use for clothianidin, new or revised spray buffer zones will be put in effect around freshwater habitats, plus:

• maximum seed treatment rates for field corn will be cut to 150 grams of active ingredient (g.a.i.) per 100 kg of seed, which cancels its use on corn rootworm;
• maximum seed treatment rate per year per hectare (ha) on vegetables is limited to 100 g a.i., limiting the planting rates for broccoli, bulb onion, carrot, cabbage, cucumber and leek;
• foliar use on cucurbits is cut to a single application of 70 g a.i./ha per season, cancelling its use for brown marmorated stink bug;
• foliar use on potatoes is reduced to a single application of 52.5 g a.i./ha per season;
• foliar use on turf is cut to a single application of 125 g a.i./ha per season, cancelling its use against hairy chinch bug, annual bluegrass weevil, bluegrass billbug and European crane fly; and
• greenhouse seed treatment use for onion maggot and seed corn maggot on bulb onions will be cancelled, “as these are only pests found in field production.”

New or revised spray buffer zones will also be required around freshwater and terrestrial habitats for use of thiamethoxam, among other restrictions including:

• a lower maximum seed treatment rate for field corn (including seed corn production), at 200 g.a.i./100 kg of seed, thus cancelling its use also against corn rootworm;
• a lower maximum seed treatment rate for soybean, at 30 g a.i./100 kg of seed, cancelling uses against bean leaf beetle, European chafer, soybean aphid and wireworm;
• lower soil drench and in-furrow rates for leafy vegetables, at 90 g a.i./ha, cancelling those uses against cabbage looper, beet armyworm, corn earworm and fall armyworm;
• lower soil drench and in-furrow rate for brassica vegetables, at 90 g a.i./ha, cancelling uses against dipteran leafminers, cabbage looper, diamondback moth, imported cabbageworm, thrips, beet armyworm, corn earworm, fall armyworm and yellowstriped armyworm;
• a lower limit of one foliar application per year on dry shelled bean, potato and soybean;
• one foliar application per year against all pests on celeriac and for pepper weevil on peppers;
• for use against stink bug, tarnished plant bug and brown marmorated stink bug in fruiting vegetables, a limit of one application at the top application rate (52.5 g a.i./ha) per year;
• one foliar application per year on cranberry; and
• a requirement to hold flood water for 30 days for cranberries that require flooding.

Health Canada said its scientists “have reviewed a large body of scientific information and concluded that a complete ban on neonicotinoid pesticides is not warranted,” and the new mitigation actions “will address the risks posed to aquatic insects.”

Revised labels reflecting the new rules must be in place “no later than 24 months from today,” Health Canada said, while “a small number of uses for which there are no suitable alternatives will continue for an additional 24 months.”

New information collected during the reviews “allowed the department to determine that some uses do not pose a risk to aquatic insects, while other uses do pose risks of concern,” Health Canada said.

During its consultations in 2018, “concerns were identified by Health Canada from available scientific information that these two pesticides are frequently being detected in aquatic environments in Canada at concentrations that may pose a risk to aquatic insects,” among them important food sources for fish, birds and other animals.

But from that point, “more than 47,000” comments were received, along with several new scientific papers plus new studies and water monitoring data from product registrants, provinces, academia and other regulatory authorities.

The final special review decisions in both cases were delayed until now from last fall’s target dates “due to the unprecedented volume of information received during consultation and the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic,” Health Canada said Wednesday.

Health Canada has scheduled webinars in English and French for April 15 to provide an overview of the special review decisions. The registration deadline for those webinars is April 12.

‘Not convinced’

Canola grower groups on Wednesday cheered the new final decision, which they said found that current use of the two products, including seed treatment, by canola farmers “does not pose an unacceptable risk to aquatic invertebrates.”

“This is great news for canola farmers as it maintains our ability to protect the canola crop at its earliest stages of development,” Mike Ammeter, chair of the Canadian Canola Growers Association (CCGA), said in a release.

“Flea beetles can dramatically reduce stand viability if not controlled early and maintaining access to these products is important for the environmental and economic sustainability of the crop.”

CropLife Canada, which represents plant biotech and ag chem companies, was also “pleased” with many aspects of the final review.

However, CropLife CEO Pierre Petelle said in a statement Wednesday, “unfortunately, in some cases — specifically in the horticulture sector — many important uses of these products will be restricted, and in some cases, removed entirely” which “may jeopardize the viability of certain types of production in Canada.”

Overall, though, Petelle said it’s “encouraging to see science prevail as (Health Canada’s Pest Management Regulatory Agency) has changed its recommendations from what appeared in the proposed decision from 2018.”

Neonic product registrants and other stakeholders “provided PMRA with significant amounts of additional high-quality data during the consultation period, which appears to have helped the agency make a more informed, risk-based decision based on the best available real-world data.”

Environmental groups, meanwhile, were less than pleased with PMRA stepping off its 2018 position.

“It is outrageous that Canada’s pesticide regulator is not delivering on its own proposed ban on neonics. European countries stopped using these chemicals years ago,” Beatrice Olivastri, CEO of Friends of the Earth Canada, said in a release Wednesday. “These neonics posed unacceptable risks four years ago, so what happened to make them safe today?”

“We are not convinced that tinkering with label restrictions will be effective in reducing concentrations of neonics in the environment,” Charlotte Dawe, a campaigner with the Wilderness Committee, said in the same release. “Certainly it will be less effective than the originally proposed ban.”

Health Canada said Wednesday it also plans to release a final re-evaluation decision for another neonic, imidacloprid, later this year, and is “in the final stages” of completing that review. — Glacier FarmMedia Network

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Health Canada said as much Thursday as it released its final re-evaluation decisions for three neonic pesticides — re-evaluations dealing specifically with the products’ potential impacts on bees and other pollinators.

The department’s assessments of the three neonics — clothianidin, imidacloprid and thiamethoxam — show “varying effects on bees and other pollinators from exposure to each of these pesticides.”

For those reasons, Health Canada said, its final decision calls for outright cancellation of some uses of the three neonics, mainly affecting the horticulture and tree fruit sectors.

For some other uses, the department plans to change conditions of use, such as “restricting the timing of application” and adding new “label statements” for uses such as cereal seed treatments.

Uses such as canola seed treatments and on greenhouse vegetables “are not expected to pose unacceptable risks to bees and other pollinators,” the agency said Thursday.

Crop protection industry group CropLife Canada hailed much of Health Canada’s announcement Thursday, saying it “affirm(s) the safety of neonics as a seed treatment and for many other uses.”

The department’s decision “confirms that in the vast majority of cases, neonics can be used effectively by farmers without unnecessary risk to pollinators,” CropLife CEO Pierre Petelle said in a statement via email.

Grain Farmers of Ontario CEO Barry Senft, in a separate statement, noted growers in that province “take several steps to protect pollinators on their farms and (Health Canada’s) decision shows that these efforts are working, as is the regulatory system that works to protect human health and the environment.”

Health Canada has been re-evaluating the three neonics since 2012 to” address growing concerns around bee health” and issued proposed decisions for clothianidin, imidacloprid and thiamethoxam in December 2017, May 2018 and December 2017, respectively.

Neonic seed treatments, Petelle said, “represent an incredible innovation that has improved agricultural sustainability and limited exposure to non-target organisms due to the very precise application of the product on the seed.”

However, he warned, the planned new restrictions and cancellations Health Canada announced Thursday will leave many growers, particularly in the hort sector, “severely impacted.”

In many cases, he said, for those growers, “there are no viable alternatives… to control certain insect pests and removing neonics for growing certain horticulture crops like apples and cherries may jeopardize the viability of certain types of fruit and vegetable production in Canada.”

The decisions

For clothianidin, Health Canada’s final pollinator decision will cancel foliar application on orchard trees and strawberries and on municipal, industrial and residential turf sites. It also limits the number of foliar applications on cucurbit vegetables to one per season.

Also, “additional label statements” will be required for clothianidin seed treatment of cereal crops.

For imidacloprid, the final pollinator decision will cancel foliar application to pome fruit, stone fruit, certain tree nuts with “high pollinator attractiveness,” lavender and rosemary. It will also cancel soil application on legume, fruiting, and cucurbit vegetables when grown outdoors; herbs harvested after bloom; small fruit and berries (caneberry; bushberry; low-growing berry; berry and small fruit vine excluding grapes); and ornamentals that are “attractive to pollinators and planted outside.”

The department would also prohibit foliar spraying of imidacloprid before or during bloom on fruiting vegetables, herbs that are harvested after bloom, legume vegetables (broad beans, fava beans andVicia faba), berry crops (with renovation after harvest for woody berries), and tree nuts apart from those with high pollinator attractiveness.

Also, additional label statements will be required for imidacloprid seed treatment of cereal and legume crops.

For thiamethoxam, Health Canada proposes to cancel foliar and soil application on ornamental crops “that will result in pollinator exposure” — in other words, crops that are planted outdoors and attractive to pollinators. It will also cancel soil application for berry crops, cucurbit crops and fruiting vegetables, and foliar application to orchard trees.

Health Canada will also prohibit spraying of thiamethoxam before or during bloom in foliar application on legume and outdoor fruiting vegetables, and on berry crops, with “renovation required” for woody berries. Foliar application on sweet potato and potato would not be allowed during bloom.

Also, “additional label statements” for thiamethoxam will be required for seed treatments of cereal and legume crops.

Risks ‘not imminent’

Health Canada proposes to put all the above risk mitigation measures in place over a 24-month period. “The risks identified (to pollinators) are not considered imminent because they are not expected to cause irreversible harm over this period,” the department said.

Members of the public have 60 days from the final decisions’ publication date to file any notices of objection, Health Canada said.

The department also noted Thursday it already put risk mitigation measures in place in 2014 to help protect bees and other pollinators from exposure to neonic-laden dust kicked up during planting of treated seeds.

With the risk mitigation measures in place from 2014 onward, Health Canada said Thursday, the number of bee incidents in 2014, 2015 and 2016 were 70-80 per cent lower than in 2013. Further decline was seen in the number of incidents reported during planting in 2017 and 2018.

Health Canada on Thursday also granted that “other factors” such as favourable weather conditions might have also contributed to the reduction in bee “incidents” and bee deaths in the crop years since 2014.

Phase-outs still proposed

All this said, the agency’s final pollinator re-evaluation decisions have no bearing on Health Canada’s separate ongoing evaluations of the “potential risks to aquatic insects” from the use of neonics.

Final decisions on those evaluations are expected at the end of this year, Health Canada said Thursday — but the department also reiterated that current research shows neonics are “detected frequently in waterbodies at levels that could be harmful to certain aquatic organisms.”

Health Canada in 2016 proposed a phase-out of most uses of imidacloprid over three to five years after a routine re-evaluation by its Pest Management Regulatory Agency (PMRA) found imidacloprid showing up at levels harmful to certain aquatic insect populations such as mayflies and midges — a “critical food source” for fish, birds and other animals.

Special reviews for both clothianidin and thiamethoxam were announced in the wake of those findings on imidacloprid. Those reviews, released last summer, found both pesticides being measured at levels harmful to aquatic insects.

As a result, Health Canada also proposed last summer to cancel all outdoor (that is, non-greenhouse) agricultural and turf uses for clothianidin, and all outdoor agricultural and ornamental uses for thiamethoxam, over three to five years, depending on availability of alternatives.

In Canada, clothianidin is marketed by Bayer as insecticides and seed treatments under brand names including Poncho, Prosper, Titan and Sepresto and by Nufarm as NipsIt.

Thiamethoxam products include Cruiser and Helix, marketed by Syngenta, while imidacloprid is sold mainly by Bayer under brands such as Admire, Gaucho, Concept and Intercept. — Glacier FarmMedia Network

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Health Canada’s Pest Management Regulatory Agency (PMRA) is proposing that two neonicotinoid pesticides, clothianidin and thiamethoxam, be phased out over the next three to five years.

Following special reviews, PMRA found that the pesticides are harmful to aquatic insects which are a major source of food for fish, birds and other animals.

The chemicals are widely used as seed treatments for the majority of canola grown in Western Canada. While the impact on bees is often mentioned in discussions on neonics, PMRA itself came out with a proposed decision in 2017 noting that the neonicotinoid seed treatments don’t negatively hurt pollinators, including bees.

“These seed treatments are used on canola to prevent the young plants from being eaten by flea beetles,” said Brian Innes, vice-president of public affairs with the Canola Council of Canada.

“We’re concerned about not having these products will have a significant impact on the canola industry,” said Innes adding “it will mean increased risks and reduced yields.”

It can be very hard to predict when the insect when flea beetles will strike a field and individual fields can be lost in as little as 36 hours, according to Innes. While foliar chemical applications are an option, the small window makes control difficult.

“If we remove the neonicotinoids, it forces people to use other alternatives,” said John Gavloski, extension entomologist with Manitoba Agriculture. There are trade-offs with other pesticides, he said, making it hard to determine the eventual impact on crop production.

Diamides are a group of chemicals that can also be used as a seed treatment against flea beetles, he said. They are not as water-soluble as neonicotinoids — which comes with its own pros and cons.

The lower water solubility of diamides means they are slower to react. However, with neonicotinoids, a rain right after planting can wash away much of the seed treatment, which would not be the case with diamides.

Gavloski said more chemical options were also being researched and should be available for the market soon.

While more tools could take the place of neonicotinoids, “we’re very concerned as a canola industry, because any tool that’s taken away from farmers has a negative impact on their ability to produce canola and manage their risk,” said Innes.

Small impacts on yields could lead to hundreds of millions of dollars of losses in the bigger picture, he said.

There is a 90-day window of comment on the PMRA proposals, and Innes said the Canola Council will review the decision to make sure all of the available information was taken into account.

“We as a canola industry very much value a science-based review process,” he said.

— Phil Franz-Warkentin writes for Commodity News Service Canada, a Glacier FarmMedia company specializing in grain and commodity market reporting. Follow him at @PhilFW on Twitter.

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PMRA officials on Wednesday announced 90-day consultation periods on its decisions for both clothianidin and thiamethoxam, following “special reviews” which found both substances being measured at levels harmful to aquatic insects.

Clothianidin, under its current conditional registration, is marketed by Bayer in Canada as insecticides and seed treatments under brand names including Poncho, Prosper, Titan and Sepresto and by Nufarm as NipsIt. Thiamethoxam’s conditional registration covers products such as Cruiser and Helix, marketed by Syngenta.

PMRA proposes to cancel all outdoor agricultural and turf uses for clothianidin, and all outdoor (non-greenhouse) agricultural and ornamental uses for thiamethoxam, over three to five years, depending on availability of alternatives.

Scott Kirby, director general of PMRA’s environmental assessment directorate, said on a conference call with reporters Wednesday that most affected products would be phased out over the shorter period as alternatives are available.

Final special review decisions are to be announced at the end of next year, Health Canada said, and “will take into consideration any comments or new information received during the consultation period.”

Special reviews for both neonics were announced in November 2016 in the wake of PMRA’s routine re-evaluation of the third major neonic, imidacloprid, sold mainly by Bayer under brands such as Admire, Gaucho, Concept and Intercept.

Through that re-evaluation, Health Canada said it found imidacloprid being measured at levels harmful to certain aquatic insect populations such as mayflies and midges — a “critical food source” for fish, birds and other animals. The department thus proposed to phase out most uses of imidacloprid over three to five years.

Special reviews, Health Canada said, are launched based on “reasonable grounds to believe that the health or environmental risks, or the value (including effectiveness), of a pesticide is unacceptable.”

An environmental assessment of clothianidin showed that, in aquatic environments in Canada, the product is being measured at concentrations that are harmful to aquatic insects and most outdoor uses of clothianidin in Canada thus are “not sustainable.”

Modelling results from a risk assessment for thiamethoxam showed a “minimal acute risk to freshwater invertebrates” but found exposure on a “chronic basis” poses a risk to those species, Health Canada said.

However, the agency deemed the risks to aquatic invertebrates from greenhouse uses of thiamethoxam to be “acceptable” and plans to allow the chemical’s continued registration for greenhouse uses, “provided wastewater mitigation instructions on product labels are followed.”

For both neonics, PMRA said it will consider any “alternate risk management proposals” put forward during the comment period, “provided that they can achieve acceptable levels in the environment within the same timeframe.”

PMRA had proposed in late 2017 to grant three-year extensions to the registrations for both products, pending the outcome of the special review, while also phasing out certain specific uses of the products to reduce risk to pollinators. Final decisions relating to the pollinator evaluation are expected at the end of this year, Kirby said.

Grain Growers of Canada, in a separate statement Wednesday, said it plans to further review PMRA’s proposed decisions.

Meanwhile, GGC president Jeff Nielsen said, the group is concerned that PMRA’s re-evaluation process “is focused on publishing proposed decisions as fast as possible,” which appears to limit the agency’s ability to ensure “all relevant information” is available.

The focus on speed, he said, also “prevents (PMRA) from engaging farmers so that we can fully understand the issues they raise, which would allow us to provide the PMRA with the information required to refine these decisions.”

Both products “are very important for our growers, and without viable alternatives, the ban will significantly impact the canola sector,” Brian Innes, vice-president of public affairs for the Canola Council of Canada, said in a separate release.

The council, which said it will also “thoroughly review” the PMRA proposal, on Wednesday cited a 2017 study of European growers’ experience without neonics, showing increased risk of insect damage, lower yields and, as a result, fewer canola acres.

“With more than 22 million acres of canola in Canada in 2018, banning these plant protection tools would have a dramatic impact,” the council said.

CropLife Canada, representing the crop protection industry, said it found the PMRA proposal “especially disappointing and confusing to many, given that earlier this year the PMRA released a seemingly contradictory proposed decision validating the safety of both of these products to pollinators as seed treatments, which is one of their primary uses.”

CropLife CEO Pierre Petelle said Wednesday the organization will also review the PMRA’s proposals and data, “correct any misinterpretation of the data and provide comments to address any information gaps identified.”

The Reuters news agency on Wednesday quoted a Syngenta Canada spokesperson as saying the company is disappointed with the decision and believes the PMRA did not consider all relevant information. Reuters also quoted a Bayer spokesperson as saying the company believes clothianidin has a “favourable environmental profile.” — Glacier FarmMedia Network

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The ban, championed by environmental activists, covers the use of three active substances — imidacloprid, developed by Bayer CropScience; clothianidin, developed by Takeda Chemical Industries and Bayer CropScience; and Syngenta’s thiamethoxam.

“All outdoor uses will be banned and the neonicotinoids in question will only be allowed in permanent greenhouses where exposure of bees is not expected,” the European Commission said in a statement.

Representatives of EU member states in the EC’s standing committee on plants, animals, food and feed on Friday supported the proposal for a new regulation to be adopted by the EC “in the coming weeks” and applicable “by the end of the year.”

Vytenis Andriukaitis, the EC’s commissioner for health and food safety, hailed the results of Friday’s vote, saying the EC “had proposed these measures months ago, on the basis of the scientific advice from the European Food Safety Authority.”

Bee health, he said, “remains of paramount importance for me since it concerns biodiversity, food production and the environment.”

Bayer called the ban “a sad day for farmers and a bad deal for Europe” and said it would not help bees. Many farmers, it said, had no other way of controlling pests and that the result was more spraying and a return to older, less effective chemicals.

The use of neonics in the European Union has been restricted to certain crops since 2013, but environmental groups have called for a total ban and sparked a debate across the continent about the wider use of chemicals in farming.

Campaign group Friends of the Earth described the decision of EU governments a “tremendous victory” for bees and for the environment.

“The European Commission must now focus on developing a strong pollinator initiative that boosts bee-friendly habitat and helps farmers cut pesticide use,” it said.

Both Bayer and Syngenta have challenged the 2013 partial ban at the European Court of Justice. A verdict is due on May 17.

Bayer, in a separate move Thursday, announced it would sell its clothianidin-based seed treatment brands Poncho and VOTiVO to fellow German chemical firm BASF.

The brands are part of a $2.65 billion asset sale to help clear the regulatory path for Bayer’s planned takeover of seed and ag chem firm Monsanto.

In Canada, two of the three neonics in question, clothianidin and thiamethoxam, are up for renewal of their conditional registrations as seed treatments and foliar- and soil-applied pesticides in field crops.

Health Canada’s Pest Management Regulatory Agency in December proposed to renew those registrations to the end of 2019.

For imidacloprid, PMRA in November proposed a three- to five-year phase-out of all agricultural uses and a “majority of other outdoor uses” of the product, citing the chemical’s presence in waterways at levels harmful to aquatic insects.

Final decisions from the PMRA on both proposals are due later this year.

— Reporting for Reuters by Philip Blenkinsop; includes files from AGCanada.com Network staff.

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The Pest Management Regulatory Agency on Tuesday issued proposed decisions on clothianidin and thiamethoxam that would extend the products’ existing conditional registrations as seed treatments and foliar- and soil-applied pesticides in field crops, to the end of 2019.

Clothianidin, under its current conditional registration, is marketed in Canada as insecticides and seed treatments under brand names including Poncho, Prosper, Nipsit, Titan and Sepresto. Thiamethoxam’s conditional registration covers products such as Cruiser and Helix.

The agency’s proposed decision stems from the re-evaluations of neonic pesticides it announced in 2012, with an eye on the chemicals’ “potential risk to pollinators in light of international updates to the pollinator risk assessment framework.”

PMRA on Tuesday also announced proposed re-evaluation decisions for clothianidin and thiamethoxam based on its pollinator risk assessments.

For clothianidin, the proposed pollinator re-evaluation calls for the phase-out of its foliar application to orchard trees and strawberries and to municipal, industrial and residential turf sites. It also proposes to reduce pre-bloom applications for cucurbit vegetables (cucumbers, squash, et cetera) from two down to one.

The re-evaluation also calls for added “protective label instructions” for cereal crop uses of clothianidin.

For thiamethoxam, the proposed pollinator re-evaluation calls for the phase-out of foliar and soil applications to ornamental crops that would result in pollinator exposure; of soil application to berry crops, cucurbit crops and fruiting vegetables; and of foliar application to orchard trees.

Foliar application of thiamethoxam to legumes, outdoor fruiting vegetables and berry crops would no longer be permitted before or during bloom, PMRA said.

PMRA’s proposals are now up for a 90-day public comment period, running to March 19, 2018. The agency’s final decisions on the products are due to be published in late 2018.

Recent separate assessments of a third neonic, imidacloprid, found it to be turning up in waterways at levels harmful to aquatic insects, leading PMRA to propose a three- to five-year phase-out of all agricultural uses and a “majority of other outdoor uses” of the product.

The proposal for imidacloprid went through a 120-day public comment period ending in March this year, to be followed by a final PMRA decision on the use of imidacloprid in Canada late next year. PMRA said it also expects to publish a proposed decision on imidacloprid pollinator safety in March 2018.

Clothianidin and thiamethoxam have also been found to occur “frequently and at comparable levels to imidacloprid” in certain waterbodies in areas of intensive agriculture, PMRA said Tuesday.

Consultation is expected in July on proposed measures for clothianidin and thiamethoxam to protect aquatic life. Final decisions on such measures are expected to follow in January 2020.

“Decade of overuse”

The Ontario Beekeepers’ Association on Thursday ripped PMRA’s proposal to continue registration for clothianidin and thiamethoxam “against overwhelming scientific evidence showing acute and chronic effects on bees.”

PMRA’s decision, OBA said, also flies in the face of “the experience of Ontario beekeepers whose bees continue to suffer from a decade of overuse of neonicotinoids on soy, corn and winter wheat.”

Noting PMRA’s plans to call for new labelling on field crop seed treatments, related to reducing dust at planting, OBA said dust from planters represents “less than five per cent of the pesticide applied to seed.”

By focusing its attention to crop dust, OBA said, PMRA “perpetuates the myth that neonicotinoids could be safe for bees if applied properly at planting time.”

Ontario in 2015 moved to limit access to neonic-treated seed only to farmers “who can demonstrate they need protection from the pests targeted” by the products in question, OBA noted.

“Ontario beekeepers are hopeful that Ontario’s Class 12 legislation will allow farmers access to crop protection in a way that also protects our vital insect pollinators,” OBA president Jim Coneybeare said in the association’s release Thursday.

“The only group that could possibly benefit from PMRA’s decision are the manufacturers of these pesticides.” — AGCanada.com Network

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The University of Guelph team, led by toxicologist Keith Solomon and adjunct professor Gladys Stephenson, analyzed 64 papers from “open, peer-reviewed literature” on the topic plus 170 unpublished studies submitted to regulators by the products’ manufacturers, Syngenta and Bayer.

The scientists, who on Monday published their findings online across five papers in the Journal of Toxicology and Environmental Health, said Bayer and Syngenta asked them to assess earlier studies conducted by or for the companies, on the impacts of pesticide-treated seeds on honeybees.

Solomon and Stephenson used a “quantitative weight of evidence” methodology, meant to gauge the quality of reported data and to compare relevance of results from different studies.

The “higher-tier” studies which Solomon and Stephenson examined were focused on the exposures of honeybees to neonicotinoids by way of “several” matrices as measured in the field, and on the effects seen in “experimentally controlled” field studies.

The Guelph team’s study involved Bayer’s clothianidin and imidacloprid and Syngenta’s thiamethoxam, all used in seed treatments for various field crops.

The original papers, Solomon said, varied in quality and “scientific rigour,” but their results generally showed no adverse effects of pesticides on honeybee hives.

For all three products, the “overall weight of evidence,” based on the studies analyzed, indicated “no adverse effects on colony viability or survival of the colony,” the team wrote in the Journal.

“At least for honeybees, these products are not a major concern,” Solomon said in a university release Tuesday — though he granted the three pesticides can kill individual honeybees, and could also pose threats to other pollinators.

That said, “use of these neonics under good agricultural practices does not present a risk to honeybees at the level of the colony.”

“Many studies look at effects of insecticides on individual bees,” he said in a release Tuesday. However, “what regulations try to protect is the colony — the reproductive unit.”

Other researchers, he said, might use the Guelph team’s results to improve studies of pesticide exposure in hives.

The Guelph researchers also stressed the importance of “good agricultural practices” in farmers’ neonic use, including making sure the treated seeds are coated and planted properly to avoid airborne contamination of bees during seeding.

The Guelph team’s results don’t necessarily apply to other insects that also serve as crop pollinators and that have shown population declines, Solomon said.

For those, he said, “there are too few studies at the colony or field level to allow a weight-of-evidence analysis.”

The team said bees and other pollinators are affected by “potentially harmful” factors, including long-distance movement of colonies for crop pollination, as well as mites and viruses, weather, insufficient food and “varying beekeeping practices.” — AGCanada.com Network

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The study, spearheaded by a team from Switzerland’s Universite de Neuchatel and published in Friday’s edition of the journal Science, was meant to assess “global exposure of pollinators to neonicotinoids.”

The team’s report emphasized the compounds occurred in honey samples “at levels considered safe for human consumption.”

However, the Swiss team wrote, “the contamination confirms the inundation of bees and their environments with these pesticides, despite some recent efforts to decrease their use.”

Of 198 honey samples sourced worldwide through a “citizen science project,” the team found at least one of five tested compounds (acetamiprid, clothianidin, imidacloprid, thiacloprid, thiamethoxam) in 75 per cent of all samples.

Thirty per cent of all samples contained “a single neonicotinoid,” while 45 per cent of the total samples contained “two or more” neonic compounds; 10 per cent contained “four or five.”

The samples were taken from all continents except Antarctica, as well as from “numerous isolated islands.”

The proportion of samples with trace levels of at least one neonic “varied considerably among regions,” with the highest in samples from North America (86 per cent), Asia (80 per cent) and Europe (79 per cent) samples; the lowest proportion was in South American samples at 57 per cent.

In all regions, at least one neonic was recorded in at least 25 per cent of samples, and three neonicotinoids (thiamethoxam, imidacloprid, clothianidin) were recorded in at least 50 per cent of samples in North America, the team wrote.

Imidacloprid “dominated overall concentrations in Africa and South America,” the team added, while thiacloprid led in Europe, acetamiprid in Asia and thiamethoxam in Oceania and North America, “reflecting regional differences in usage of specific pesticide types.”

“Our results confirm the exposure of bees to neonicotinoids in their food throughout the world,” the team wrote, and “the coexistence of neonicotinoids and other pesticides may increase harm to pollinators.”

The Ottawa-based Canadian arm of environmental group Friends of the Earth viewed the Swiss team’s findings as evidence supporting a “complete and permanent ban” on neonic pesticides.

“Bees collect nectar and pollen from their environment and, like the canary in the coal mine, they provide early warning of toxins. This study points to the urgent need to ban neonics,” John Bennett, senior policy advisor for Friends of the Earth Canada, said in a separate release Thursday.

“We also have the right to know what pesticides are being used where and when — it’s time for Canada to require pesticide use reports.”

Specifically, the group said, pesticide users “should be required to report time and location of use,” which would provide “much-needed information on the cocktail of pesticides encountered by honey bees and wild, native bees.” — AGCanada.com Network

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Citing research led by Lars Straub at the University of Bern, Switzerland, the report says neonicotinoid pesticides were found to cut the lifespan of the drones by a third.

Scientists say the research, which has been published in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B, offers an explanation for higher rates of honey bee mortality and declining wild pollinators in recent years.

Neonicotinoids have come under increasing scrutiny in recent years and have been banned from use on flowering crops in the EU since 2013.

The researchers exposed drones to the neonicotinoids, thiamethoxam and clothianidin. They found that they had on average 39 per cent less living sperm compared with unexposed bees.

In fact, 32 per cent of the drones were dead at 14 days, which is when they usually reach sexual maturity. By comparison, 17 per cent of unexposed drones were dead before they were mature enough to mate.

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Scientists who conducted the research said their findings showed that at least one neonicotinoid in the banned group — clothianidin — may have been unfairly named as among the offenders.

This insecticide did not show the same detrimental effects on bee colonies as the others, imidacloprid and thiamethoxam, the researchers found. All three neonicotinoids have been subject to an EU-wide moratorium on their use.

In Canada, clothianidin is an active ingredient in Bayer CropScience pesticides such as Poncho, Prosper and Titan, and in Valent’s Nipsit, Arena and Clutch.

All three of the so-called “neonics” are approved and registered in Canada, although jurisdictions such as the province of Ontario have moved to limit their use in seed treatment, citing risks to bees.

“(From our findings) we can clearly see that the banned neonicotinoids are not the same, so they should be considered independently when considering risk and legislation,” Chris Connolly, a specialist in bee research at Dundee University’s neuroscience department, told reporters at a briefing.

He said the results suggested it would be premature to place a permanent ban on the use of clothianidin. “That said, a moratorium on its use should continue until the knowledge gaps are filled on its wider impact on other species,” he added.

Often with yellow and black stripes and bigger than honeybees, bumblebees live in small nests of up to 200 and do not make honeycombs. Europe has around 68 species of bumblebee, and some are commercially bred to pollinate tomatoes and other crops in greenhouses.

The European Union limited the use of neonicotinoid chemicals — made and sold by various companies including Bayer and Syngenta — two years ago, after research pointed to risks for bees, which are crucial for pollinating crops.

Crop chemical makers say the research blaming neonicotinoid pesticides is not backed up by field evidence. They argue that a global plunge in bee numbers in recent years is a complex phenomenon due to multiple factors.

To try and find out more, and to test the effects of each of the three neonicotinoids separately, Connolly’s group worked with colleagues from St. Andrews University on a study involving 75 bee colonies at five separate locations in Scotland.

They found that while imidacloprid and thiamethoxam had the negative effects seen in previous research, clothianidin did not pose the same threat for bumblebees.

“What we have found is that imidacloprid and thiamethoxam, but not clothianidin, exhibit toxicity to bumblebee colonies when exposed at field-relevant levels,” Connolly said.

Given these results, he said, specialists should examine in more detail the effect of each chemical on each species.

“Small changes in the pesticide structure or its target site in insects are likely to be critical to risk assessment,” he said. “Each pesticide/insect combination needs to be considered independently.”

— Kate Kelland is a Reuters health and science correspondent based in London, England. Includes files from AGCanada.com Network staff.

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