Scientists are warning about a second Silent Spring after a new study found that U.S. agriculture is 48 times more toxic to insects than it was 20 years ago.
A peer-reviewed study published in the journal PLOS One found that 92 percent of that toxic load can be attributed to neonicotinoids — the most widely used class of insecticides.
Neonics, as they are commonly called, are 1,000 times more toxic to bees than DDT, the infamous pesticide exposed by Rachel Carson’s work in the 1960s, says Dr. Kendra Klein, a report co-author and senior scientist at Friends of the Earth.
A big reason that neonics are so dangerous is that they persist in the environment — sometimes lasting up to 1,000 days. They remain in the soil and can be taken up by other plants. They’re also water soluble, so they wash into rivers, streams and wetlands. Their toxicity can build up in the environment and cascade from soil to plants, insects to birds.
Neonics first hit the agriculture market in the 1990s and are mostly applied as a coating on seeds. They’re used on 140 different crops but most prevalently on corn and soybeans.
“Farmers have a great deal of trouble finding uncoated seeds because these [pesticide] companies also dominate the seed market,” says Klein.
This is not the first study to raise concern about neonics. Based on earlier warnings, the European Union banned their use in outdoor agriculture last year. Similar efforts have been initiated in the United States but haven’t gained much traction so far. One bill, the Saving America’s Pollinators Act, which would suspend the use of neonics and establish a review process for other pesticides that could harm pollinators, has yet to make it out of committee in the House of Representatives, where it was introduced.
“Pesticide companies have a great deal of power in Washington, D.C.,” says Klein.
Other recent research on the plight of insects has been grim. A study published in April in Biological Conservation warned that 40 percent of the world’s insect species are facing extinction in the next few decades.
That’s bad news not just for insects but for the rest of us, too.
“Insects are the basis of the food webs that sustain all life on Earth,” says Klein. “Without insects we would have ecosystem collapse.”
Truthout Is Preparing to Meet Trump’s Agenda With Resistance at Every Turn
Dear Truthout Community,
If you feel rage, despondency, confusion and deep fear today, you are not alone. We’re feeling it too. We are heartsick. Facing down Trump’s fascist agenda, we are desperately worried about the most vulnerable people among us, including our loved ones and everyone in the Truthout community, and our minds are racing a million miles a minute to try to map out all that needs to be done.
We must give ourselves space to grieve and feel our fear, feel our rage, and keep in the forefront of our mind the stark truth that millions of real human lives are on the line. And simultaneously, we’ve got to get to work, take stock of our resources, and prepare to throw ourselves full force into the movement.
Journalism is a linchpin of that movement. Even as we are reeling, we’re summoning up all the energy we can to face down what’s coming, because we know that one of the sharpest weapons against fascism is publishing the truth.
There are many terrifying planks to the Trump agenda, and we plan to devote ourselves to reporting thoroughly on each one and, crucially, covering the movements resisting them. We also recognize that Trump is a dire threat to journalism itself, and that we must take this seriously from the outset.
Last week, the four of us sat down to have some hard but necessary conversations about Truthout under a Trump presidency. How would we defend our publication from an avalanche of far right lawsuits that seek to bankrupt us? How would we keep our reporters safe if they need to cover outbreaks of political violence, or if they are targeted by authorities? How will we urgently produce the practical analysis, tools and movement coverage that you need right now — breaking through our normal routines to meet a terrifying moment in ways that best serve you?
It will be a tough, scary four years to produce social justice-driven journalism. We need to deliver news, strategy, liberatory ideas, tools and movement-sparking solutions with a force that we never have had to before. And at the same time, we desperately need to protect our ability to do so.
We know this is such a painful moment and donations may understandably be the last thing on your mind. But we must ask for your support, which is needed in a new and urgent way.
We promise we will kick into an even higher gear to give you truthful news that cuts against the disinformation and vitriol and hate and violence. We promise to publish analyses that will serve the needs of the movements we all rely on to survive the next four years, and even build for the future. We promise to be responsive, to recognize you as members of our community with a vital stake and voice in this work.
Please dig deep if you can, but a donation of any amount will be a truly meaningful and tangible action in this cataclysmic historical moment. We are presently looking for 98 new monthly donors before midnight tonight.
We’re with you. Let’s do all we can to move forward together.
With love, rage, and solidarity,
Maya, Negin, Saima, and Ziggy