What’s killing millions of bees in Brazil?
"I had my apiary about 300m away from the soya plantation. I got there and the bees were rolling in agony on the ground, dizzy from the poison"
Brazil may be the biggest market for highly hazardous pesticides in the world, according to a new analysis of 2018 industry data. Almost two thirds of the toxic chemicals sold in Brazil were used on soya, grown to meet global demand for animal feed.
Pesticide poisonings of bees in Brazil are on the rise. As part of an Unearthed investigation into the global trade of highly hazardous pesticides, we sent a video journalist to the state of Rio Grande do Sul to speak to beekeepers dealing with the chemical fallout from Brazil’s soya boom.
Both had lost hives to an insecticide called fipronil, commonly used on soya. According to our investigation, fipronil is one of nineteen pesticides sold in Brazil that has been classified as highly toxic bees.
Read the investigation here.