Bees in Decline [PDF]

Xxxxxxx Bees in Decline A review of factors that put pollinators and agriculture in Europe at risk Greenpeace Research Laboratories Technical Report (Review) 01/2013 Bees in Decline A review of factors that put pollinators and agriculture in Europe at risk Greenpeace Research Laboratories Technical Report (Review) 01/2013 Executive Summary 3 For more information contact: [email protected] 1. Introduction: Importance of bees and other pollinators for Written by: agriculture and ecosystem Written by Reyes Tirado, Gergely Simon and Paul Johnston conservation 13 Greenpeace Research Laboratories, University of Exeter, UK 2. The global and European situation with bees and other Front and back cover images © Greenpeace / Pieter Boer pollinators 17 Honeycomb background image 3. The main factors affecting © Greenpeace / Pieter Boer bee populations’ health 23 4. Insecticides 29 5. What we can do to protect bees and other pollinators 37 6. Conclusions and recommendations 43 References 44 JN446 Published April 2013 by Greenpeace International Ottho Heldringstraat 5 1066 AZ Amsterdam The Netherlands Tel: +31 20 7182000 greenpeace.org executive summary Executive Summary The next time you see a bee buzzing Bees – including the managed honeybees, together around, remember that much of the food with many wild species – are the predominant and most we eat depends significantly on natural insect- economically important group of pollinators in most geographical regions. Managed honeybees, however, have mediated pollination – the key ecosystem been suffering increasingly in recent years, even as the service that bees and other pollinators provide. world moves progressively towards growing more crops that are dependent on bee pollination. Similarly, the role of Without insect pollination, about one third of the crops wild pollinators – bee species, as well as other insects – is we eat would have to be pollinated by other means, or gaining relevance worldwide, and attracting increased they would produce significantly less food. Up to 75% research attention. Moreover, wild bees are also threatened of our crops would suffer some decrease in productivity. by many environmental factors, including lack of natural Undoubtedly, the most nutritious and interesting crops and semi-natural habitats, and increased exposure to in our diet (including many key fruits and vegetables), man-made chemicals. together with some crops used as fodder in meat and Put in simple terms, bees and other pollinators – both dairy production, would be badly affected by a decline in natural and managed – seem to be declining globally, but insect pollinators; in particular, the production of apples, particularly in North America and Europe. Lack of robust strawberries, tomatoes, and almonds would suffer. regional or international programmes designed to monitor The most recent estimate of the global economic benefit the current status and trends of pollinators means there of pollination amounts to some €265bn, assessed as is considerable uncertainty in the scale and extent of this the value of crops dependent on natural pollination. This decline. Nonetheless, the known losses alone are striking. is not a “real” value, of course, as it hides the fact that, In recent winters, honeybee colony mortality in Europe has should natural pollination be severely compromised or averaged around 20% (with a wide range of 1.8% to 53% end, it might prove impossible to replace – effectively between countries). making its true value infinitely high. And how much value can we place on the abundance of colour that greets us on a bright spring day, for example? Beside crop plants, most wild plants (around 90% of them) need animal-mediated pollination to reproduce, and thus other ecosystem services and the wild habitats providing them also depend – directly or indirectly – on insect pollinators. Bees in Decline Greenpeace Research Laboratories Technical Report (Review) 01/2013 3 executive summary Three important concerns regarding the global health of pollinators can be identified: Currently, there are no 1 accurate data available to reach firm conclusions on the status of global pollinators in terms of their abundance and diversity. As demand for pollinators – both locally and regionally – increases faster than the 2 supply, we could be facing limitation of pollination, currently and in the near future. This is because the growth in cultivation of high- value, pollination-dependent crops is outpacing growth in the global stock of managed honeybees, while wild Honeybee population pollinator abundance and abundance is very uneven diversity is also constrained. 3 among agricultural regions: there is growth in some honey-producing countries, but decline elsewhere, including regions with high agricultural production in the US, and in the UK and many other western European countries. 4 Bees in Decline Greenpeace Research Laboratories Technical Report (Review) 01/2013 executive summary In some specific regions of North America, East Asia and The ability of bees to resist diseases and parasites seems Europe, the value of pollination can be as high as $1,500 to be influenced by a number of factors, particularly their US dollars per hectare; money that farmers – and society nutritional status and their exposure to toxic chemicals. at large – will be losing if pollinators were to decline in Some pesticides, for example, seem to weaken honeybees those regions. Large parts of Italy and Greece have that then become more susceptible to infection and exceptionally high values attached to pollination benefits, parasitic infestation. together with extensive regions in Spain, France, the UK, Germany, the Netherlands, Switzerland and Austria, Industrial agriculture which also have high pollination value “hot spots”. Pollinators, managed or wild, cannot escape the various Recent “warning signals” of the tensions between and massive impacts of industrial agriculture: they pollinator decline and crop yields may exist in the suffer simultaneously from the destruction of natural observed increases in prices from 1993 to 2009 for some habitats caused by agriculture, and, because pollinators’ pollination dependent crops. If we are to avoid additional natural ranges inevitably overlap with industrial farming limits to food production and further deforestation to landscapes, the harmful effects of intensive agricultural increase the area of agriculture land, we must work practices. to address the underlying factors putting stress on Fragmentation of natural and semi-natural habitats, pollination services, focussing on the impacts on expansion of monocultures and lack of diversity all play honeybees and wild pollinators. a role. Destructive practices that limit bee-nesting ability, and the spraying of herbicides and pesticides, make No single factor can be blamed for the overall global industrial agriculture one of the major threats to pollinator decline in bee populations, or in their overall health. communities globally. This decline is undoubtedly the product of multiple factors, both known and unknown, acting singly or in On the other hand, agriculture systems that work with combination. biodiversity and without chemicals, such as ecological farming systems, can benefit pollinator communities, both Nonetheless, the most important factors affecting managed and wild. By increasing habitat heterogeneity pollinator health relate to diseases and parasites, and for bees, for example, ecological mixed-cropping systems to wider industrial agricultural practices that affect many can provide additional flower resources for pollinators. This aspects of a bee’s life cycle. Underlying all the other emphasises the potential beneficial roles of ecological/ factors, climate change is also putting increased strains organic agriculture methods. on pollinator health. Some pesticides pose direct risk to pollinators. The elimination of bee-harming chemicals Climate change from agriculture is a crucial and most-effective first step to Many of the predicted consequences of climate change, protect the health of bee populations. such as increasing temperatures, changes in rainfall patterns and more erratic or extreme weather events, will Diseases and parasites have impacts on pollinator populations. Some of these Many beekeepers agree that the external invasive changes could affect pollinators individually and ultimately parasitic mite, Varroa destructor, is a serious threat to their communities, becoming reflected in higher extinction apiculture globally. Other parasites, such as Nosema rates of pollinator species. ceranae, have been found to be highly damaging to honeybee colonies in some southern European countries. Other new viruses and pathogens are likely to put further pressure on bee colonies. Bees in Decline Greenpeace Research Laboratories Technical Report (Review) 01/2013 5 executive summary Insecticides Insecticides in particular pose the most 1) Physiological effects, which occur at direct risk to pollinators. As their name multiple levels, and have been measured indicates, these are chemicals designed in terms of developmental rate (i.e. the to kill insects, and they are widely applied time required to reach adulthood), and in the environment, mostly around malformation rates (i.e. in the cells inside the cropland areas. Although the relative role hive), for example. of insecticides in the global decline of 2) Perturbation of the foraging pattern, pollinators remains poorly characterised, it for example through apparent

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