The U.K. Government will reportedly support a total ban on neonicotinoid pesticides in farms across Europe, environment secretary Michael Gove has said. 

The decision would reverse the government's previous position and has been made due to recent new evidence showing neonicotinoids have caused damage to colonies of bees, The Guardian reported.

Studies recently found that 75% of all flying insects have disappeared in Germany.

Neonicotinoids are the world’s most widely used insecticide but in 2013 the European Union banned their use on flowering crops, although the U.K. was among the nations opposing the ban.

The European Commission now wants a total ban on their use outside of greenhouses, with a vote expected in December, and the U.K.’s new position makes it very likely to pass, the story reported.

“The weight of evidence now shows the risks neonicotinoids pose to our environment, particularly to the bees and other pollinators which play such a key part in our £100bn food industry, is greater than previously understood,” Gove wrote in an article for The Guardian.

“I believe this justifies further restrictions on their use. We cannot afford to put our pollinator populations at risk.”

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