The European Commission’s Plan Bee: Attack of the Killer Bureaucrats
The European Commission is proposing to ban certain pesticides under the precautionary principle without adequate consideration of available science or concern for the potential catastrophic...
View ArticleBeeswax! Is Something Rotten in the State of SANCO?
Something went very wrong earlier this year with how DG SANCO pushed through a precautionary ban on neonicotinoid pesticides to "save the bees", in a period of four months, without proper evidence,...
View ArticleThe “Save the Bees” Ban: Failed Crops and another Precautionary Fail: Who is...
The recent precautionary ban on neonicotinoid pesticides to save the bees has gone badly wrong in less than a year. Oilseed rape crops are being devastated and Member States are now allowing neonics to...
View ArticleIUCN’s Anti-Neonic Pesticide Taskforce: An exposé into activist science
What if scientists got caught acting without scientific integrity? What if they formed a group with political ambitions to juice up the science so they could campaign against another group? Would they...
View ArticleThe Bee-Sting: Activist Scientists and the Abuse of Power
The third and final activist bee science blog looks at how activist scientists have got into government panels like EFSA and are changing the way risk assessments are done. Laden with conflicts of...
View ArticleMessage to the IUCN Activist Scientists: Rules Matter
The IUCN Taskforce on Systemic Pesticides has been set up essentially as a political front group - they do not do any original research, are not transparent on their membership or amount of funding and...
View ArticleThe Logic of Risks
Are Naturalist Nutters showing signs of inconsistency or of a sudden logical outburst when they criticise those who do not vaccinate? Hardly - they are exhibiting a perfectly justifiable illogic that...
View ArticleThe Derogation Dance: Against the lawyerisation of European policy
Stupid legislation from Brussels leads to frustration, an inability to comply and the resort of having to turn to lawyers to continue to properly function. Rather than getting rid of bad regulators in...
View ArticleFarmers Matter : An open letter to Michael Flüh on bees and neonicotinoids
Dear Dr Flüh Congratulations on your appointment as acting director responsible for bee-health in DG Santé. Your predecessor who had campaigned long and hard against the chemical and biotech...
View ArticleBees may sting, but bee campaigners prick
May is parade month in Brussels, but one cannot help but already notice the impressive parade of stupid marching through this town, and nowhere more can this be better exemplified than in the...
View ArticleSave the Bees! Ban these two toxic pesticides immediately
There is hypocrisy in the pesticide regulations when two natural but toxic pesticides used by the organic industry are clearly seen to kill bees and are still kept on the market. There is more evidence...
View ArticleThey killed the cats! Precaution, superstition and eco-zealots
The Great Plague of London showed the precautionary principle at its worst when they killed the cats. Today environmental zealots seem to find delight in "drowning kittens".
View ArticleEFSA’s Neonicotinoid Scandal, Part II: Illogical, Illegitimate, Illegal
EFSA has tried to use an illegitimate bee guidance document to reject the main bee science and push for a further ban on neonicotinoids.
View ArticleActivist Creep also Matters. An Open Letter to EFSA Director Hubert Deluyker
EFSA needs to account for conflicts of interest of NGO activists involved on their corrupted draft Bee Guidance Document. At least they could give me the courtesy of answering my question.
View ArticleDave Goulson: Portrait of an Activist Scientist
As NGOs are funding more activist science, we need to consider whether this research is worthy to be included in policy debates, or if bias is built into the methodology. Dave Goulson is an activist...
View ArticleThe Risk-Monger’s Dirty Dozen – 12 highly toxic pesticides approved for use...
Most people think that organic produce is pesticide-free. This is what the organic food lobby wants you to think, but the reality is that they are often more toxic to humans, bees and the environment....
View ArticleHow to Deal with Stupid: Part 2/10 – Social Media: How stupid gets its wings
Part 2 in the ten-part series on how to deal with stupid looks at how stupid gets its wings. With the growth of social media, bad ideas, virally spread and well repeated in a form of mass-messaging, do...
View ArticleHow to Deal with Stupid – Part 6/10: The Denormalisation of Industry
Part 6 deals with Stupid's strategy to remove industry from being a legitimate actor or stakeholder in policy debates. They have been very successful in denormalising tobacco, now fossil fuels and...
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