This page is a part of the corpus (Annexe 1) used to write Stéphane Foucart and neonicotinoids.
Here, I relate what the journalist said in his article “Sauvegarde des pollinisateurs : l’échec de la Commission européenne”. All quotes, originally in French, were translated by me.
The European Court of Auditors reportedly issued a report on July 9, ruling that the European Commission’s measures to protect wild pollinators have “not borne fruit”. In its report, the Court recalled the importance (estimated at € 15 billion) of wild pollinators for agricultural production and that their decline is due to “the growing threat posed by human activity […], in particular the conversion to intensive agriculture, as well as the use of pesticides and fertilizers.”
A study published by Nature in October 2019 would observe a drop of 67% between 2008 and 2017 in the weight of arthropods captured on a sample of 150 German meadows, of 78% of their number and of 34% of their diversity. The Court criticized the “European Strategy for Biodiversity 2011-2020 and the European Initiative for Pollinators, adopted in June 2018.” The first would have had very incomplete or non-existent indicators and the second would have had no convincing results, a lack of resources and follow-up.
It also criticized the inadequacy of the ban on the 3 main NNIs in 2013 and 2018. On the one hand “farmers have resorted more to thiacloprid” and on the other hand many Member States have provided for exemptions. She also echoed criticism of the flaws in the risk assessment of pesticides. A preliminary EFSA report on the subject, dated June 22, would consider 4 approaches to reforming risk assessment, three of which consist of “scaling back levels of protection.” The subject would be put on the agenda of a committee of European experts to meet on July 16 and 17.
Mr Dermine from PAN-Europe reacted by noting that thirty years after the “neonicotinoids affair”, “Member States continue to be reluctant to improve the authorization criteria for pesticides and, once again in a secret meeting, will consult each other. to render the protection of pollinators obsolete. “