It is important that our members have the opportunity to tell us what matters to them and to share their experiences as a member. There are two easy ways for you to do this. Either go onto the members' forum or email us your views.
Have Your Say
Voice your Opinion Now
Bees - the facts
What you need to know about bees!
Approximately one-third of what we eat is pollinated by bees.
In the UK alone, bees contribute £165m a year to the economy through pollination. In all, bees play a crucial role in pollinating some 90 commercial crops worldwide.
Crops reliant on bees for pollination include: apples, pears, raspberries, plums, cherries, onions and broccoli. However, it's not just fruit and vegetables that are reliant on bees; alfalfa, a major cattle crop, is 90% reliant on pollination by bees and therefore beef and diary are also partially reliant on bees.
In southern Sichuan, China, pear trees are pollinated by hand after the uncontrolled use of pesticides in the 1980s killed the honeybee population.
The British Beekeepers Association (BBKA) estimates that if people were to take over the job of pollination from bees in the UK, it would require a workforce of 30 million.
Bees also work hard pollinating our gardens, meaning better flowering plants and increased yields of fruit and vegetables.
What could be causing these losses?
No-one knows for certain what is causing the hive losses; however there are many theories including:
- pests (such as varroa mites), viruses, bacteria and fungi
- pesticides such as neonicitinoids, which are picked up by bees as they pollinate crops treated with these pesticides
- loss of native bees species which are adapted to survive in colder climates
- lack of nutrition and loss of habitats - related to urban sprawl and farming methods
- bad weather, including spells of particularly wet weather or sudden cold spells
- poor husbandry - for example in the USA beekeeping is a vast industry, with bees trucked vast distances across the country to pollinate different crops