The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on Wednesday confirmed longstanding fears that a widely-used pesticide can pose a significant risk to honeybee populations.

The first risk assessment released by the agency on the long-term impact of neonicotinoids focused on the most popular class of the insecticide, imidacloprids. Slammed by researchers as a “deeply flawed” study, the EPA nonetheless found that when used on certain crops, pollinator hives exhibited a dangerous level of chemical residue.

If pollinators were found carrying nectar back to the hive with a greater than 25 parts per billion concentration of imidacloprid, likely effects included decreases in population as well as less honey produced, the EPA stated. 

The analysis found that “citrus and cotton may have residues of the pesticide in pollen and nectar above the threshold level. Other crops such as corn and leafy vegetables either do not produce nectar or have residues below the EPA identified level.”

The Associated Press described the findings as “a nuanced answer that neither clears the way for an outright ban nor is a blanket go-ahead for continued use.”

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Lori Ann Burd, environmental health director with the Center for Biological Diversity went further than that. The EPA analysis, she told Common Dreams, is “deeply flawed” because it only analyzed the effect of imidacloprid on honeybees, and “ignored the 4,000 species of native bees” as well “other pollinator species, including butterflies, some of which are now listed as endangered species.”

Despite the fact that recent studies have shownthat neonics have an “especially dangerous effect” on wild bee populations, the EPA analysis “focused exclusively on honeybees as a proxy for all pollinators,”—a move Burd describes as “absolutely inappropriate.”