Insect Numbers

Part of 1. Questions to the Minister for Environment, Energy and Rural Affairs – in the Senedd at 2:13 pm on 3 February 2021.

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Photo of Joyce Watson Joyce Watson Labour 2:13, 3 February 2021

Thank you, Minister, but I was alarmed to see the UK Government's recent u-turn on allowing some farmers to use neonicotinoid pesticides—or neonics, which is easier to say—an incredibly harmful pesticide, on sugar beet crops. In 2018, the UK Government declined a similar application to use neonics and supported restrictions on these pesticides across the European Union, and, at the time, the UK Government said that those restrictions would remain in place unless the evidence changed. Well, it hasn't changed. The only thing that's changed is Brexit. In fact, the evidence showing how harmful these pesticides are has grown in three years. They cause damage not only to bees and the other insects, but to the soil, to wild flowers and to the river ecosystems that we've spent some time talking about already today. So, Minister, what assessment have you made regarding this u-turn, and what assurances can you give that the Welsh Government will not make a similar u-turn on harmful pesticides, particularly given the catastrophic reduction in insects in recent years?