The European Commission has banned the use of insecticide, fipronil, after fears about the damage it was doing to bees.
Widely used across Europe by farmers, fipronil will be banned from use on corn and sunflowers from the end of 2013, after member states overwhelmingly backed the proposal in a vote.
Tonio Borg, European commissioner for health, said: "A few weeks ago, in the aftermath of the restriction on use of neonicotinoids, I pledged to do my utmost to protect Europe’s honey bee population and today’s agreement with member states, not only delivers on that pledge but marks another significant step in realising the Commission’s overall strategy to tackling Europe’s bee decline."
In the vote, the UK, Slovakia and the Czech Republic abstained and Spain, the biggest user of fipronil, and Romania voted against. The UK was also one of eight of the 27 EU member states that unsuccessfully opposed the EC neonicotinoid ban.
Fipronil is manufactured by the German chemical company BASF and they expressed their disappointment with the ruling.
"The decision regarding fipronil was derived from an assessment that focused heavily on new technical areas for which no established regulatory evaluation criteria are yet available," said Jürgen Oldeweme, of BASF Crop Protection.
"Moreover, sound data from field studies that underpin the safe use of our product for bees were not considered sufficiently. We are certain that Europe can achieve both – the protection of pollinators and the support of European agriculture – but for that all stakeholders must engage in a comprehensive action plan to address the real root causes of the decline in bee health."
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