Over the past decade, the European Union has been tightening its regulatory grip on neonicotinoid insecticides in response to an increasingly strong body of research suggesting they are lethal for pollinators such as bees.
But four neonicotinoid insecticides the EU has banned are still being used in the region thanks to a legal loophole.
In May 2013, the European Commission (the EU’s executive branch) banned the use of three neonicotinoids—imidacloprid, thiamethoxam and clothianidin—on flowering crops attractive to pollinators as well as cereals. In May 2018, it went further and banned all outdoor uses of the trio, and in February 2020, it decided not to renew the approval of a fourth neonicotinoid called thiacloprid, resulting in its