THE Scottish Greens have urged the Scottish Government not to follow the UK Government’s lead in allowing sugar beet farmers to use a bee-killing pesticide.

Earlier this week, the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) approved an emergency application for thiamethoxam, a neonicotinoid seed treatment.

It was one of three treatments whose use outdoors was banned across the EU over concerns of the impacts on bee populations.

Studies suggest neonicotinoids weakens bees’ immune systems, and can harm their development, leaving them unable to fly, gather food and breed.

Defra has said their U-turn on thiamethoxam was only granted because it was “exceptional circumstances where diseases or pests cannot be controlled by any other reasonable means”.

They insisted its use would be carefully targeted.

The National Farmers’ Union (NFU), who lobbied for the decision, said some growers were experiencing yield losses of up to 80%.

But campaigners are furious, and fear the decision, taken just two weeks after the UK fully left the EU, is a sign of things to come.

In a letter to Environment Secretary Roseanna Cunningham, Scottish Greens environment spokesperson Mark Ruskell called the UK Government’s decision “regressive”.

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He warned it “risks disastrous long-term consequences for our environment”.

Ruskell said: “We are in a nature emergency in Scotland, with one in nine species at risk. That is why we cannot allow the UK Government’s reckless Brexit to lead to the use of toxic pesticides already banned by the EU.

“The Scottish Government has repeatedly said that environmental standards will not be compromised as a result of Brexit, so this is an early test of that resolve. If England seems destined to return to its former status as ‘the dirty man of Europe’, then Scotland needs to stand tall and maintain its European protections.

“Ministers must rule out the use of these chemicals in Scotland, and commit to fully eradicating their use in the coming years. Not just in agriculture but in fishing and forestry too.”

Responding, Rural Affairs Minister Ben Macpherson said the Scottish Government would always be led by the science.

He said: “In response to the evidence of their effect on the environment, the Scottish Government supported the EU decision in 2018 to restrict the outdoor use of three neonicotinoid insecticides. Then UK Environment Secretary, Michael Gove agreed that the risk to our environment, particularly to bees and other pollinators was such that restrictions were necessary.

“However on 8 January 2021, the UK Government announced that it had authorised a pesticide product containing one of these neonicotinoids for use on sugar beet seed in counties of eastern England. Sugar beet is not grown here and the product is not authorised for use in Scotland.

“We take the use of chemicals seriously and our position on the use of neonicotinoids and other pesticides continues to be driven by science.”