EPA: Pesticides could be causing honeybee population collapse

The Environmental Protection Agency announced Wednesday that there is evidence indicating a common pesticide could be causing some pollinators, including honeybees, to die. Beekeepers and environmentalists have long suspected the pesticide imidacloprid to be a cause of "colony collapse disorder," or the widespread death of bees — but the EPA is only just beginning its preliminary assessment to consider whether to control the use of the pesticides. In the European Union, imidacloprid is one of several banned pesticides.

Imidacloprid is used to keep pests like aphids and beetles from killing crops by attacking their central nervous systems. However, the EPA acknowledged that the pesticide "potentially poses risk to hives when the pesticide comes in contact with certain crops that attract pollinators." Some critics don't think the EPA went far enough in their report, because the organization chose to focus on honeybees specifically rather than looking also at native bee species. Others see the EPA's study as too little too late.

"The problem is we should have all been looking at this stuff a long time ago. The same people who produced the chemicals are the ones that did the testing in the first place, and now all the EPA has gone and done is asked those companies to retest those chemicals," beekeeper Dave Hackenberg told The Guardian.

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Larrissa Walker, the head of the pollinator program at the Center for Food Safety, felt the same. "We have been saying for several years now that the EPA has enough information and data available to them to take strong action and to severely reduce the amount we are using these chemicals. The new report supports the need for the EPA to really reduce and restrict the use of these chemicals," Walker said.