Coveney failed to make stand on bees

Great to hear that the EU has banned bee-harming pesticides, but this wonderful news is overshadowed by the fact that our own Agricultural Minister failed to take a stand against the use of products that threaten, not just bees, but by extension the vital process of pollination upon which a high percentage of our food depends.

The pesticide giants had waged a lavishly-funded campaign to dissuade EU member states from backing the ban. They had enormous resources at their disposal and the services of the best PR firms that money could buy. In the weeks leading up to the vote, the corridors of power in Brussels and Strasbourg became hives of activity as the lobbying intensified.

Thankfully enough states placed the proven ecological value of the bee above commercial; and short-term political, gain.

The bee has been a friend to humankind for millennia. It occupies a special place in the folklore and literature of almost every nation. Yeats rhapsodised about building a “hive for the honey bee” in one of his great poems.

But for all their proven worth to us humans, and their complex societal structures, the bees may yet not be able to withstand the ravages of human greed and ignorance. How sad that Minister Coveney saw fit to abstain in the vote.

John Fitzgerald

Callan

Co Kilkenny