EU discusses pollinator decline at Bee Week

Last week was the 7th annual Bee Week in the European Parliament and the main theme discussed was “How is the agricultural community mobilised to protect bees?”.

NFU South West Combinable Crops Chairman and Vice-Chair of Copa-Cogeca’s Cereals Working Party, Mike Hambly chaired a workshop on how the agricultural sector supports bees, highlighting the actions taken by farmers to promote pollinator populations on farmland.

At the high level conference which closed the week, EU Agriculture Commissioner Phil Hogan stated that a decline in pollinators poses a “serious threat” to European farming. He highlighted the recent EU Pollinator Initiative, which sets out actions for the EU and member states to tackle pollinator decline.

EU Environment Commissioner Karmenu Vella also said that pollinators are vital for food production and called for a strong support for the Pollinator Initiative in order to send a strong message to citizens about the need to address pollinator decline.

Published: 06/07/2018 at 15:36

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Posted by: Joe RoePosted on: 12/07/2018 17:26:53

Comment: Just this week I wrote to a national newspaper regarding badgers pulling out pollinators' nests in the hedgerow banks round my farm. I attached photographs of a destroyed nest my son found on Sunday. Since Sunday I have found another 2 nests destroyed in the same 150m stretch of hedgerow. There is a very active badger set 4 fields away. We have overgrown hedges and hay meadows full of flowers and to my knowledge none of my neighbours use practices that would damage pollinators. However despite our encouragement there is nothing we can do to protect them from the ever increasing badger population. I told the paper that since I was a teenager walking this land in the 1960's the badger population has changed from 1 set about 2 miles away to 4 sets on the farm or within 200m.
Luckily we don't have a TB problem in the immediate area at present but the ecological damage done by the disproportionate badger population to pollinators and ground nesting birds is very serious indeed.