Neonicotinoids

[garynortheast]

Originally Posted by Grant66

I'm kind of liking the "use less sugar" option.


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Me too.....

[yokohama]

Originally Posted by Grant66

I'm kind of liking the "use less sugar" option.


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The Government wouldn't like that! Where would that leave their 'sugar tax?'
Something our great leader was thinking about a couple of years ago to make us all fitter IIRC.

[Dave20046]

Originally Posted by yokohama

The Government wouldn't like that! Where would that leave their 'sugar tax?'
Something our great leader was thinking about a couple of years ago to make us all fitter IIRC.

Aye, nothing to do with British Sugar's close links to the gov.


For what it's worth I too would choose less sugar than less bees.

Sugar is packed into so many things needlessly. When I make bread I put 0 sugar in it, 3% of warburtons product is sugar ... in fact I just did a quick google and you can all elect me soon : - 12 million loaves sold a day apparently (288million grams of sugar) and one news article I just read says adults across the UK consume 38 million grams of added sugar per day. No accounting for children or even if the article I read is anywhere near the mark for actual current supply, but I reckon if they were forced to stop creeping it into essential products up and down the country no one would notice and nature wouldn't disintegrate.

[Grant66]

Originally Posted by DJ123

My guess is the less natural sugar would = more chemicals/additives as replacements.

Disappointingly I think your probably right.

But as Dave(numbers) points out a lot of products add sweetness to substitute for actual food. Trying to have a sugar free diet is extremely difficult.


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[Seeker]

In the US they put a tax on sugar cane imports which caused the price of sugar to rise. The companies switched to using high fructose corn syrup in everything because it's cheap. The human body cannot cope with large amounts of fructose it gets absorbed into the bloodstream and stored as fat, sucrose has to be broken down first, both are bad but fructose is worst.

It is often referred to as the Devil's Candy in the US: https://childhoodobesitynews.com/201...-devils-candy/

[Red Herring]

So I'm getting the drift here that folk want the government to force the sugar industry to basically close down and reduce production, on the basis that this will force the population to eat less sugar........? This thread started with us being asked to write to our MP's so unless we want it to go straight into the bin marked loony mail we had better come up with a slightly more realistic proposal than that.

[Seeker]

Originally Posted by Red Herring

So I'm getting the drift here that folk want the government to force the sugar industry to basically close down and reduce production, on the basis that this will force the population to eat less sugar........? This thread started with us being asked to write to our MP's so unless we want it to go straight into the bin marked loony mail we had better come up with a slightly more realistic proposal than that.

No. Neonics kill pollinators, 95% of all plants on Earth need pollinators.

https://www.pollinator.org/pollinato...201200%20crops.

Here's the alternative:
https://chinadialogue.net/en/food/51...inate-by-hand/

[Red Herring]

I don't dispute the need for bees (I've two hives at the bottom of my garden) but what's your proposal for avoiding using the chemicals?

[Seeker]

Originally Posted by Red Herring

I don't dispute the need for bees (I've two hives at the bottom of my garden) but what's your proposal for avoiding using the chemicals?

I wish I was clever enough to answer. It seems, to me, to be one of those short sighted decisions where profit is ranked higher than sustainability. Reduced crop yield versus famines through lack of pollinators. I don't know if there are any suitable alternatives but a quick search yielded this table. Do they work, are they cheap?

https://www.savehoneybees.info/image...icotinoids.pdf

I think it's another one of those climate change kind of decisions - burning fossil fuels is a cheap way to supply energy but isn't sustainable for our survival yet one argument against fixing the problem was cost. Using an insecticide that may eradicate our essential crop pollinators with the argument against (not using them) being cost feels like deja vu.

We tend to put a price on everything except our long term future.

[Red Herring]

Originally Posted by Seeker

I wish I was clever enough to answer. It seems, to me, to be one of those short sighted decisions where profit is ranked higher than sustainability. Reduced crop yield versus famines through lack of pollinators. I don't know if there are any suitable alternatives but a quick search yielded this table. Do they work, are they cheap?

https://www.savehoneybees.info/image...icotinoids.pdf

Is that what you put in your letter to your MP?

I'm sorry if you think I might be trolling you on this, that's not my intention, but few things wind me up more than armchair experts telling people they shouldn't be doing something if they are unable to make a sensible, realistic and achievable suggestion as to an alternative. There is no doubt in my mind that as a population we need to be investing more into ways of reducing our impact on this planet, unfortunately we live in a capitalist environment where the majority are more interested in what is best for them, rather than their compatriots or decedents......