#Farming Friday 35: Hear from an organic farmer who argues for a rational and balanced response to neonicotinoid pesticides. An approach that could be effective in all aspects of food discussions!
The environmental impact of neonicotinoid insecticides, their effect on bees and other pollinators and the appropriate response continues to be a topic of hot debate. I’ve addressed this topic on my blog before; below is an article I authored for the Genetic Literacy Project – see the original and the discussion here.
As an organic farmer, I get lots of invitations to sign petitions to ban things like insecticides herbicides or GMOs. When I was younger, I used to sign these petitions and even share them with others, often accompanied with white-hot exhortations that others should sign them too.
More often than not these days, I find myself cringing a little when these passionate pleas cross my screen. The hot topic recently has been neonicotinoid insecticides (neonics), which are blamed by some scientists and activists but not others as a key driver of spike bee deaths. Predictably the views…
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Thought + Food 