Will the UK's pollinator strategy be enough to stop bee decline? The government's strategy for protecting pollinating insects, including bees, fails to adequately address one of the major threats to their health say scientists, environmentalists and opposition politicians. The national pollinator strategy (NPS), launched on Tuesday by environment secretary, Liz Truss, focuses on measures that will provide insects with "food and a home." But scientists, environmentalists and rival politicians, while broadly welcoming of the strategy, say the government is wilfully downplaying the issue of pesticides. Experts also raised concerns about the lack of specific targets and mandatory actions in the policy. Shadow environment secretary Maria Eagle criticised Truss for failing to mention pesticides in a speech on Tuesday to launch the NPS. "Liz Truss has managed to make a speech about pollinators without once mentioning pesticides which is like making a speech about climate change without mentioning carbon," said Eagle. Bee biologist Dave Goulson said the government's strategy contained the same blind spot. He said the government had put in place weak, voluntary measures to limit the use of chemicals known to affect pollinators. The biggest driver of wildlife declines in the UK has been the push for ever more intensive farming systems, dependent on very high pesticide inputs. The NPS suggests that it will encourage farmers to adopt "Integrated Pest Management" (IPM) strategies that aim to reduce pesticide input, but it offers no practical mechanism to achieve this. Most farmers are highly unlikely to even read the NPS, let alone change their farming practices as a result," said Goulson. The NPS does contain provisions to further research the link between neonicotinoids and bee declines. These seed treatments have been temporarily banned by the EU (a move which the UK lobbied against) due to mounting evidence that they interrupt the life cycles of bees and lead to population declines. However the research is to be lead by the pesticide industry, a move Nick Mole from the Pesticide Action Network likened to "putting the fox in charge of the hen house." Mole said: "The Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (Defra) needs to change its way of thinking and adopt bold and progressive initiatives to reduce and stop the use of pesticides that do harm to pollinator species instead of kowtowing to the bad science that is held up by the pesticide industry to protect their products and profits." Defra said on Tuesday that the EU's laws on neonicotinoids require the pesticide industry to deliver research on the effects of their products. But this does not reasonably explain why they have placed the industry at the helm of the new research being pursued as part of their new pollinator strategy. Commentators, including Guardian journalists Damian Carrington and George Monbiot, have suggested the National Farmers Union and the pesticide industry have exerted influence over the government in order to weaken their stance on neonicotinoids, which some farmers say are a vital method of pest control. The strategy leaves open the possibility that the government will allow farmers to return to using the chemicals if the EU ban is not renewed next year, a stance Labour MP and chair of the Environmental Audit Committee (EAC) Joan Walley said was disappointing. "They are right to propose more research aimed at developing further field-trial data, but I believe Defra should acknowledge that the balance of evidence available from lab tests and other field-trials already clearly demonstrates the need for the ban on the precautionary principle," said Walley. Green MP and EAC member Caroline Lucas agreed that a UK ban on neonicotinoids was the key weakness in the policy. Crucially, as recommended by the Environmental Audit Committee, we need an urgent ban on the use of pesticides that pose a risk to our pollinators. Surprisingly little is known about populations of pollinators in the UK. The lack of a historical population census for these species means there is no "population baseline." This means scientists do not know whether bee populations are actually declining. The strategy sets out measures to establish these baselines. Despite the lack of concrete population data, scientists are concerned about the survival of many species of pollinator. The diversity of bee species found in many parts of Britain is known to be declining. These insects are a keystone of the environment and agriculture because of their symbiotic relationship with many plant species. The UK's wildflower-rich grasslands - prime pollinator habitat - have been reduced by 97% since the 1930s. One of the few concrete numbers in the NPS is a commitment of £900m of Common Agriculture Policy funding between 2015 and 2020 for "Countryside Stewardship" - taken from a £3.1bn rural development fund announced in January. Some of this money will be given to farmers in return for the protection and restoration of hedgerows and meadows. Buglife chief executive Matt Shardlow said the push to restore these habitats was vital and welcome. But he said the lack of specific targets for restoration was worrying. He said research suggests pollinators need "tens of thousands" of hectares of meadows restored in order to maintain stable populations. The NPS does not say what proportion of the £900m would go towards recreating habitat, nor does it give an indication of how many hectares it expects to deliver. "If they are serious about protecting pollinators they need to be setting targets out," said Shardlow. [The lack of targets] must mean they have some doubts about whether they can achieve this themselves. One of the aspects of the scheme widely reported and supported universally is the advice to the community on how they can support pollinator populations. Letting lawns grow and flower, planting pollinator-friendly trees and leaving piles of logs to create nesting sites are two ways homeowners have been encouraged to contribute. But a lack of knowledge about which species of plant support certain pollinator species meant this advice was incomplete, according to Norman Carreck, science director of the International Bee Research Association. There is... an assumption throughout the document that we fully understand which plants are suitable for pollinators, and how to establish and maintain them. Actually there are significant gaps in our knowledge. A wide coalition of NGOs welcomed many of the conditions in the NPS, with reservations particularly focussed on the treatment of pesticides. Friends of the Earth campaigner Paul de Zylva said: "Everyone can help reverse bee decline and the government is relying on everyone to play their part. It will be odd if we all step up to act while the pesticides and farming industry is allowed to carry on in the face of overwhelming evidence that use of so many bee-harming chemicals is a major cause of their decline. But Goulson said the NPS, which relies on the voluntary contributions of partner organisations to deliver many of its goals, might "turn out to be a paper exercise with little impact on the real world." Most of these organisations... were already working flat out to help pollinators. It is hard to see that they can suddenly achieve more under the umbrella of the new NPS," said Goulson. RSPB agriculture policy officer Ellie Crane said the strategy placed the onus on farmers to "make more space for nature in our countryside." RSPB welcomes the NPS as a step towards co-ordinated action on helping pollinators. With so much of the country covered by farmland, action in the farmed environment will be crucial," said Crane.