The EU RL for Honeybee Health held its 7^th. annual workshop on 17^th. October 2017. The main activities conducted by the EU RL in 2017 were presented. The agenda focused on the enhancement of diagnostic tools in parasitology, virology and bacteriology, the production of reference materials and the organization of two interlaboratory proficiency tests (ILPTs) in 2017 – one on Nosema spores counting by microscopy and another on the determination of neonicotinoid residues in beebread.

Besides the presentation of the main actions and activities conducted by the EU RL, participants had the pleasure to listen to presentations from various NRL representatives. In addition, Dr. Panuwan Chantawannakul (Chiang Mai University, Thailand) was invited to present current knowledge on Tropilaelaps spp. mites.

Dr. Metka Pislak Ocepek, from the Slovenian NRL, gave a talk on their activities and the honey bee health status in their country. Hemma Köglberger, from the Austrian NRL presented a surveillance study set up during one year in Austria to collect data on colony losses. Dr. Franco Mutinelli presented a state of play of the occurrence and surveillance of the small hive beetle in Southern Italy and Kirsty Stainton from the British NRL showed the actions set up following the detection of Asian hornet specimens in United Kingdom in 2016.

We thank all the speakers for their interesting presentations and to all contributors of this fruitful workshop.

Presentations can be found on this page.