Bee poisoning incidents. Honey bee poisoning incidents over the last ten years, as reported by bee keepers in the Netherlands | [Incidents d'empoisonnement d'abeilles. Incidents d'empoisonnement d'abeilles pendant les dix dernières années, rapportés par des apiculteurs aux Pays Bas]
2001
Oomen, P.A. ((Plant Protection Service, Wageningen (Pays-Bas). Department of Phytopharmacy))
The Netherlands does not have a formal honey bee poisoning incidents monitoring scheme. But since ten years a voluntary monitoring is functioning. Bee keepers inform the national Associations of beekeepers of any poisoning incident of which they suspect pesticides as being the cause. The Associations bring this information together in a standardised database. Independently, the Agricultural Inspection Service (AID) investigates all incidents brought to their knowledge and about which there are good indications that the Pesticide Act has been violated. The information from the AID is added to the database. The database is analysed every year in order to verify the effectivity of the measures to protect honey bees from pesticide hazards. Over the last ten years (1989-1998), the number of incidents appear to vary between 21 (in 1994) and 175 (in 1996). Incidents occurred mainly in the Eastern and Southern provinces of the Netherlands where agriculture is most intensive. Arable crops, in particular potato, are the crops most involved in incidents. Insecticides, in particular organophosphates are most often given as the cause of poisoning. The voluntary monitoring, although evidently not at all as reliable as investigative monitoring, gives a reasonable overview of the character and size of the actual honey bee incidents caused by pesticides as experienced by bee keepers. It has served already for the Board for the Authorisation of Pesticides to review the risk mitigation regulations for use of organophosphate insecticides in potato crops
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