![]() ![]() “Pollinators are the poster child for the loss of biodiversity, habitat and the use of pesticides,” said Martin Dagoberto, policy director for the Northeast Organic Farming Association’s Massachusetts chapter, on Tuesday. More: Study: Acidic ocean could devastate Cape Cod and Islands shellfish industry ![]() Neonicotinoids became the pesticide of choice, the most widely used and studied in the world, and they are found in approximately 300 insecticide products, according to Deirdre Cummings, legislative director for the public interest group MASSPIRG.īut concern about the affect neonicotinoids were having on non-targeted insects, pollinators in particular, led MASSPIRG, the Northeast Organic Farming Association, the Massachusetts Beekeepers Association and dozens of other agricultural, environmental, climate and pollinator advocacy groups - as well as Massachusetts legislators and other state government officials - to campaign for a ban on their use except by licensed pesticide applicators. This family of pesticides had the additional benefit of being less toxic to vertebrates, and were more easily absorbed by neurotransmitters in insect brains. Neonicotinoids were developed in the 1990s, when crop-destroying insects such as aphids, leafhoppers, beetles and caterpillars demonstrated increasing resistance to existing pesticides.
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