Several environmental groups are taking the federal Pest
Management Regulatory Agency to court for allowing two neonicitinoid
seed-treatment pesticides to remain on the market.
They point to reservations the PMRA has had about the
potential impact on bee colonies to claim that they should have been pulled
from the market.
Ontario angered crop farmers when it announced strict
limitations on the continued use of neonicitinoids as seed treatments. The
Grain Farmers of Ontario filed a lawsuit and lost and filed an appeal and lost
again.
The lawsuit was
filed in Toronto by the David Suzuki Foundation, Friends of the Earth Canada,
Ontario Nature and the Wilderness Committee.
"The Pest
Management Regulatory Agency does not have reasonable certainty about the risks
of these products, which they're required to do," said Charles Hatt, the
lawyer arguing the case.
Hatt said the
agency has a history with two so-called neonics, clothianidin and thiamethoxam,
dating back about a decade.
"What you
see is that for a number of years the (agency officials) will note that they
are concerned about risks to pollinators, to bees, from chronic toxicity and
that they need field studies to determine the nature of the risk.
“Then they will
request that information from the proponent (the manufacturers and
distributors) and they either get something they deem inadequate, or they get
nothing at all.
"But they
continue to register and re-register the product.
"We've had
a situation where for years, they're continuing these product registrations
without the scientific information that the agency itself flags as critical for
determining the risks of these pesticides."
The federal
government has yet to file a response in court.
Maybe the environmental activists could spend a few days in a corn field, picking worms.
