INDIANAPOLIS – Dow AgroSciences LLC, a subsidiary of The Dow Chemical Corporation, after the recent approval of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), has begun full scale manufacture of a controversial, insecticidal ingredient called Sulfoxaflor. This news is putting bees in the bonnets of apiarists everywhere, as the EPA’s classification of the chemical is highly toxic to honey bees.
When bees pollinate plants sprayed with Sulfoxaflor, hives end up looking like this.
A Novel Chemical?
Sulfoxaflor was invented by Dow AgroSciences. Its intent is to control many of the sap-feeding insect pests that plague a number of major crops, including cotton, soybean, citrus, nuts, grapes, potatoes, vegetables, and strawberries. Dow sees a bright financial future in their new chemical, but this wouldn’t be the first time Dow banked off of chemical warfare, either…
Get The Gas Masks
During WWI, The Dow Chemical Corporation established itself as a supplier for many of the war materials previously imported from Germany. Dow produced magnesium for incendiary 
flares, monochlorobenzene and phenol for explosives, and bromine for tear gas. By 1918, 90% of Dow Chemical production was geared towards the war effort. Now it appears as though the EPA has given them license to wage chemical warfare in this century, only this time the first wave of unintended casualties will be the honey bees.
The EPA’s Conflicting Message
Word of the EPA’s approval of of Dow AgroScience’s unconditional registration of the new insecticide on Tuesday, May 7th, came as a surprising contradiction after the agency held a “Pollinator Summit” only months earlier on March 5th, 2013. At the summit’s conclusion, the EPA’s announced intention was to protect bees and other pollinating species while finding solutions to the current decline in bee populations worldwide.
“The Pollinator Protection Team’s strategic plan reflects the importance of pollinators to human health and the environment and lays out our goals to advance the science, policy and outreach for pollinator protection,” was the statement offered on the summit’s website.
A map showing states affected by Colony Collapse Disorder back in 2007
Colony Collapse Disorder
Sulfoxaflor is a chemical that scientists across the globe have linked to Colony Collapse Disorder(CCD), resulting in the widespread decimation of hives around the world. CCD is a phenomenon where all of the worker bees in a hive suddenly disappear. Worker bees are vital to the hive because they control the flow of food and also maintain hive temperatures for the brood. Without worker bees, the hive collapses.
Would you miss ‘em? Probably.
It’s estimated that 30% of the world’s food crops need bees for pollination, and 90% of wild plants that animals rely on for food require insect pollinators, including cotton for our clothing. Many of the plants reliant on the bee’s pollination are in the medicines we take daily. If bee’s were suddenly to vanish, life as we know it would become next to impossible.
Internet Opposition
Grassroots movements have begun appearing on Facebook and across the internet. Petitions are being signed and appeals are being filed in the wake of the EPA’s latest oversight of what kind of damage Sulfoxaflor could do; not only to the bee industry and beekeeper hobbyists, but to the environment as a whole.
Awareness is what it’s all about!
You can get more information and do these sites a ‘solid’ by clicking on these links and ‘LIKING” their pages…
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Give-a-Shit-about-Bees/427686113928795
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Save-the-Bees-for-Four-Years-More/655950167754253
https://www.facebook.com/EpaAbuse
https://www.facebook.com/disappearingbees
https://www.facebook.com/OccupyEPA
https://www.facebook.com/honeybees.ca
https://www.facebook.com/PapaRansHoneyBees
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Colony-Collapse-Disorder-Save-The-Honey-Bees/373727802185