OOC post.
Sorry it took me a while to get back to you, but Real Life happened.
The New Nordic Union wrote:Protection of Insect Pollinators
Titles are important, so for some alliteration fun, I'd suggest changing yours to "Pollinator Protection", or at the very least "Protecting Pollinators".
Category: Environmental
Area of Effect: Agriculture
Strength: Significant
Catergories like Environmental have Areas of Effect, not strengths.
This august World Assembly,
You can drop the "august" from it.
Recognising
When I and others are suggesting that you remove text effects from the proposal, it's not because we disliked italics or bolding that much. It's because there is at least one superdelegate who will very likely vote (and thus use all their endorsement votes as well) against the proposal, if they're otherwise undecided. So we're suggesting that you don't do it, to maximize your chances of passing this.
Recognising the importance of pollination for the agricultural industryand thus, human nutrition, with about 80% of crop species dependent upon biotic pollination pollinators;
There are people whose nations don't have all-human (or even any human) populations, so since the sentence loses nothing if that's struck out, I suggest striking it out. Also, be aware that preamble is often the only bit that people (who don't come to this forum and are the majority of the voters) read, you should make your argument as clear as possible. So I suggest the
change to the wording to make it clearer, since "biotic" is not a word everyone will be familiar with.
Noting that the overwhelming majority of biotic pollination is carried out by pollinators are insects pollinators, especially when regarding agricultural crops;
Same as above, using simple but precise terms. Also, you already said the bit about agricultural crops, there's no need for repetition in the preamble.
Alerted by reports of decline in populations of insect pollinators, due to several factors such as parasites, insecticides, and climate change;
I would change this one in its entirety, perhaps to something like "Alarmed by the effect that the unwise use of insecticides to protect crops can have on insect pollinators". That narrows down your idea and explains why you're concentrating on insecticides instead of parasite control (which, funnily enough, is often done with insecticides) or stuff to try to slow down/stop/reverse the climate change. It also allows for the nations that would not
have issues with any of the above. Remember that not all nations reside on the RL Earth, so they don't necessarily have all the same issues.
Wishing to protect biological diversity;
This is a bit weird of a sentence, given your focus on insect pollinators that are farmed pollinators (beekeeping). Farming any animal by definition makes biodiversity go down, since the farmed animals will have an unfair boost in inter-species (and even intra-species) competition. And also because insecticides are sometimes used to improve biodiversity by getting rid of invasive species. I would suggest either dropping it entirely or making it reflect the fact that biodiversity would be a "bonus benefit" from reducing the use of insecticides.
Willing to ensure the supply of important agricultural crops for future generations;
Which will likely require the use of insecticides to protect important agricultural crops from pest insects. So you're better off focusing on protecting the insect pollinators throughout. You've chosen a narrow focus, stick to it.
1. Defines
I would add the modifier "for the purposes of this resolution" after that word. That way you don't have to check each and every single previous resolution that even mildly has any effect on this, before writing any of the definitions.
a. ‘insect pollinator’ as an insect that moves pollen from the male anther of a flower to the female stigma of a flower, including but not limited to bees, pollen wasps, ants, flies, lepidopterans, and beetles;
This wordiness could be vastly reduced by rewording it as "..."pollinator insect" as an insect that moves pollen from one flower to another of the same plant species". You don't really need to list the different kinds of insects that get the job done, and in any case, why are you singling out butterflies with the Latin-ish name, not the others?
b. ‘domesticated insect pollinators’ as such Insect Pollinators as are bred, kept and used by humans to intentionally pollinate crops;
Drop the random capitalization, and I would strike out the reference to humans, for the reasons I already gave earlier. I would also add "keeping" as you don't just breed them and release them into the wild. Also you don't need the word "intentionally".
c. ‘pollinator keeper’ as any person or entity that exercises control over individual Domesticated Insect Pollinators or colonies thereof, including but not limited to location, feed, and medical treatment;
This makes adding "kept" even more important for the above, but it is unnecessarily wordy. You don't really need to describe everything that a (bee)keeper does, either. Also, you use this definition on a single subclause of clause 3, so I'm not entirely certain why it needs defining.
d. ‘biotic pollination crop’ as any agricultural crop that is dependent on pollinationfor reproduction or development of fruits by insects;
Again, "biotic" is not necessary, especially if you use the "for the purposes of this resolution" modifier. I'd used "pollinated crops" instead, leave out the struck-out words and add the underlined.
e. ‘pollinator insecticide’ as any insecticide that is harmful to Insect Pollinators;
Drop the random capitalization. Also, I would make that read "...as any chemical insecticide..." so as to not target
spiders non-chemical methods that might
occasionally eat bees harm some insects that pollinate crops.
2. Establishes the Bureau for the Protection of Insect Pollinators (BPIP) to exercise the powers delegated to it by this and future resolutions;
No. You'll want to keep committee involvement to the minimum. Make the nations do as much as possible on their own, only use the committee if there's no other way.
3. Requires Member Nations to
Drop the random capitalization from "member nations" here and everything in the subclauses.
a. Assess the situation of Insect Pollinators, Domesticated Insect Pollinators, Biotic Pollination Crops, and the use of Pollinator Insecticides in their territory every two years, and refer this Assessment to the BPIP;
Why? Also, wouldn't assessing the effects of insecticides on pollinators be a more fruitful effort?
b. Develop a National Action Plan to improve the situation of Insect Pollinators;
Why? What's included in the plan? What should be done as improvements? I'd scrap this entirely.
c. Discourage the establishment of monocultures, especially of Biotic Pollination Crops, to ensure year-round feed for Insect Pollinators;
...what? Why? And what "year-round feed"? Have you ever heard of this thing called "winter"?
d. Discourage the use of Pollinator Insecticides;
"Requires to discourage" isn't what you should be writing, you should make this entirely its own clause, not a random subclause, and then have it fight clause four for supremacy.
e. Ensure the protection and encourage the establishment of Insect Pollinator-friendly environments, such as meadows, lynchets, or gardens;
What are lynchets and how do they help pollinating insects? For that matter, how do meadows help? Or are you talking about leaving fields fallow to allow
weeds wild flowering plants to grow there? And gardens do not
necessarily contain any plants that need insect pollination. If you want flowers, specify flowers.
Also, who should pay for the meadows and gardens and whatnot? The crop farmer? The pollinator keeper? The municipality/state?
f. Ensure that the needs and requirements of Insect Pollinators are taken into consideration in planning, zoning, and construction; if the planning, zoning or construction is to happen in uninhabited or undeveloped areas, special consideration is to be given to the concern;
Okay, you need to make this its own clause, so you can give it more attention. Also, if you're not completely focused on the insecticides, you should say something about it in your preamble.
g. Ensure that Pollinator Keepers in the Nation report any significant loss of Domesticated Insect Pollinators;
Wouldn't this already be part of the situation assesment you're making nations do?
h. Report to the BPIP any nationally significant loss of Domesticated Insect Pollinators, especially due to epidemics;
Why? And what epidemics? Epidemic control already has a resolution.
4. Prohibits Member Nations from using or authorising the use of new Pollinator Insecticides;
...even if they were less damaging to the pollinators than the existing ones? Isn't that completely backwards? Also that would stop nations from using new insecticides to get rid of invasive species, since your only modifier in the definition is "harmful".
Smoke is harmful, yet it's used by beekeepers to make the bees less annoyed with the meddling with their nests.
5. Encourages Member Nations to take further steps for the protection of Insect Pollinators;
Such as? Aren't the million subclauses of clause 3 enough?
6. Requires the BPIP to
Remember what I said about only using the committee when you absolutely must? Create it in this clause, since you're now actually giving it stuff to do.
a. Collect the Assessments of individual Member Nations referred to it pursuant to Section 3 (a) of this Resolution;
Making my point there - if you make the committee gather the data, the nations don't need to actually send it, as the committee does that.
b. Merge and consolidate the data thus gained into a Global Assessment on the current status of Insect Pollinators, Domesticated Insect Pollinators, Biotic Pollination Crops, and the use of Pollinator Insecticides;
...you've already said that, haven't you? Also, what does "merge and consolidate" mean and what the use in doing so? What is the data used for anyway?
c. Support Member Nations in developing their National Action Plans pursuant to Section 3 (a) of this resolution, if they so wish;
If they so wish? And you still haven't explained what the plans are supposed to be about.
d. Collect the Reports by Member Nations pursuant to Section 3 (h) of this Resolution and, if necessary, develop an Action Plan to counteract the loss of Domesticated Insect Pollinators;
Lose the random capitalization. And again, what plan? You're already mandating an awful lot of things for nations to do, what are they going to need extra plans for?
7. Enables the BPIP to conduct further research and education on the topic of the Protection of Insect Pollinators;
No! Bad proposal! No cookies for you! There's no reason you shouldn't make the nations do that. Though not entirely sure what education has to do with anything.
8. Affirms that this Resolution does not touch upon the topic of pesticides being used in chemical warfare.
Annnnd this clause and clause four are locked in eternal struggle over supremacy.
Posted: Wed Apr 04, 2018 5:03 pm
