Multinationals Discuss Plans of Attack to Identify Cause of Bee Losses

Honey bees contribute over $14 billion to the value of U.S. crop production alone.

Honeybees contribute over $14 billion to the value of U.S. crop production alone.

According to the European Crop Protection Association (ECPA) approximately 70% of the world’s most produced crop species rely to some extent on insect pollination, contributing an estimated $243 billion to the global economy. The most common pollinator, the Western honeybee, has been making headlines in recent years for all the wrong reasons.

Advertisement

According to Randy Oliver, of ScientificBeekeeing.com, beekeepers are experiencing profit-crushing mortality rates of 30% to 80% compared to a historical overwintering norm of 5% to 10%. Beekeeping has become an essential part of modern agriculture, with ECPA referring to the honeybee as a domesticated species. Most academic groups agree that the epidemic known as Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD) appears to have largely run its course. Still, losses of one in three honeybees each year is an unacceptable attrition rate for an element of the industry that, according to the 2010 The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity report, contributes as much as 9.5% to the bottom line of global agricultural production with fruit, rape seed and vegetables being the most reliant crops.

The global response to the issue has been rapid and wide-ranging. The European Commission made the monumental decision to restrict the use of neonicotinoid pesticides in April of 2013, despite the fact that a qualified majority voted against the ban. The United States Environmental Protection Agency, however, recently reviewed the situation and concluded there was no scientific evidence that neonicotinoids are causing serious problems with bee colonies. EU Reference Laboratories reported that polled laboratories voted the most prominent reasons for CCD as diseases, the Varroa mite and the American Foulbrood, which is caused by the spore forming Paenibacillus larvae, a bacterium. The lack of a consensus for the actual cause of the issue has created confusion and distrust amongst consumers, and, for that reason, companies are investing heavily in research to find the CCD culprit. Below are the responses of some of the heaviest hitters in the agrochemical industry as to what they are doing to contribute to the rescue of the one of world’s most valuable species.

 

Top Articles
ADAMA Reports Fourth Quarter and Full Year 2023 Results

■ Syngenta

Caydee Savinelli, Ph.D.
Entomologist and Syngenta Pollinator and IPM Stewardship Lead

For more than 12 years, Syngenta has supported bee health through its Operation Pollinator initiative. Operation Pollinator is a global program that increases the number of native pollinators in agricultural landscapes by creating essential habitats on farmlands. In the U.S., research for Operation Pollinator has been conducted in three states – California, Florida and Michigan – with the participation of growers and three universities. The goals are to increase biodiversity and the native bee population, as well as improve growers’ crop (fruits/vegetables) yields and quality.

Syngenta has a pollinator stewardship plan that targets two major areas. The first area addresses best-management practices and stewardship of our products to help protect pollinators. The second centers on improving pollinator habitats and increasing pollinator resources.

This past September, Syngenta announced six commitments of its new “Good Growth Plan” to address the global food security challenge. One of those commitments focuses on encouraging more biodiversity on farmlands to improve bee health through habitat restoration and additional food resources.

Most scientists, including EPA and USDA experts, believe that declines in bee health are caused by multiple stressors working in combination. They include parasites, diseases, loss of suitable habitats, poor nutrition, unusual weather conditions, commercial hive-management practices, genetics as well as potential exposure to pesticides. This was recently documented in the USDA and EPA May 2013 “Report on the National Stakeholders Conference on Honey Bee Health.” The report states multiple factors play a role in honeybee colony declines, including parasites and disease, genetics, poor nutrition and pesticide exposure. While no one factor may be catastrophic on its own, appreciating and understanding the complexity of their interactions may be the key to improving the health of honeybees.

Pollinators and modern agricultural products both are vital to our food supply. And science shows that bees and other pollinators can coexist safely with modern agricultural technology.

 

■ Monsanto

By Jerry Hayes
Beelogics Lead

Feeding the world is not a proposition or a one-dimensional effort. It takes coordination, focus and an understanding of agriculture in all of its forms and directions. Monsanto’s goals are to help agriculture and the environment through sustainable practices. What could be more fundamental than trying to help the keystone managed pollinator of plants in the home garden, commercial growers, the forest or field than the honeybee?

Honeybee health is being impacted by many things. The most important and devastating impact on honeybees comes from an invasive parasite introduced from Asia called Varroa mite, which sucks the blood of honeybees, introduces viruses and bacteria and makes honeybees sick.

Monsanto, through its acquisition of a company called Beeologics, made the commitment to use the technology that Beeologics created to address honeybee health in a more focused and safer way than has ever been done before. But, to get this right, Monsanto wanted to be sure that it understood this new challenge and opened the door to experts that could educate them.

The first action was to form a group of outside advisors called the Honey Bee Advisory Council (HBAC) made up of experts from universities, beekeepers and honeybee industry suppliers. HBAC meets regularly to review Monsanto’s honeybee health direction and progress.

Information formulated by HBAC directed Monsanto to partner with Project Apis mellifera also known as PAm. PAm is one of the most respected and active organizations that works with growers and beekeepers to provide better field conditions for honeybees, primarily when the 1.6 million colonies of honeybees are brought to California very early in the year to pollinate the 850,000 acres of almonds in bloom. PAm aims to help honeybee health by engaging growers to plant additional flowering plants for food for honeybees brought to California from across the nation.

In addition, in June of this year the first of its kind conference of industry leaders, researchers, and government officials convened at Monsanto in St. Louis under the direction of PAm and HBAC for a honeybee Health Summit. The Summit was a two day meeting to understand and address a plan to collaboratively join together and organize the industry to focus on key elements of honeybee health that can only be solved or resolved by a like-minded and motivated industry. The information brought forward from the Summit is being moved forward with the leadership of Monsanto to form a Honeybee Health Coalition that will include leaders from the Summit but also, others in agriculture, government and industry to form working groups with the goal to proactively learn how to partner and work collectively to regenerate the beekeeping industry.

This small insect, the honeybee, is bringing us together and impacting all of us in ways that will be transformative for decades to come.

 

■ Bayer CropScience

By Robyn Kneen
North American Bee Care Manager

For more than 25 years, Bayer has been committed to environmental stewardship and the protection of beneficial insects and bees. Our proactive measures have been developed and implemented in close cooperation with many stakeholders and encompass the following components:

Bee Health Research

In addition to the significant field testing and experimental design of bee health studies that are normal components of our biological research, Bayer operates and maintains our own research apiaries to better understand the factors impacting bee health. For many years Bayer has been a leader in developing hive management products to help beekeepers cope with the destructive pests that infest their colonies. As a part of our research effort, we are developing new innovative delivery systems, such as our Varroa Gate technology, to more effectively manage the parasitic Varroa mite, considered the single most detrimental pest of North American honeybees. We also recently initiated a Sentinel Hive Project, which works directly with commercial beekeepers to help monitor the health of their colonies in close proximity to agricultural production. Bayer collaborates with third-party bee researchers to identify and resolve issues facing honeybee health and our bee experts are active participants in scientific forums dedicated to bee health.

Training and Education

Bayer has trained nearly 300 employees in North America as part of its Bee Ambassador Program, which helps spread the word on what our industry can do to enhance pollinator health. This year, our Bee Care Tour, a mobile exhibit which traveled 2,000 miles in six Midwestern states, drew more than 2,300  visitors at agricultural universities to foster better education and collaboration among growers, beekeepers, researchers and others interested in honeybee health. Bayer representatives also are active in local and nation-wide events to promote bee health awareness, such as the National Pollinator Week activities, which included a social media pollinator pledge campaign, and by planting bee-attractive gardens on our sites and in our communities, as seen most recently in Kansas City.

Stewardship

Our ongoing stewardship measures have been developed in close cooperation with many stakeholders to continuously improve the proper use of our technologies. We recently announced very favorable field trial results of our new fluency agent seed application technology, which is designed to significantly reduce potential dust exposure to honeybees during the corn planting process.

In addition, we’ve created a campaign called CARE (Communicate, Awareness, Responsible and Education), as a way to stimulate further collaboration – a key component of stewardship. Bayer works with growers and beekeepers to adopt best management practices to reduce potential risks to bees. While Bayer supports the Environmental Protection Agency’s efforts to enhance pollinator safety by providing greater consistency to the label language used by pesticide applicators, we will continue to work with regulators to ensure that this language does not prevent growers from safely protecting their crops against destructive pests.

North American Bee Care Center

This year, Bayer CropScience began construction of the North American Bee Care Center at its headquarters in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina. Opening in early 2014, the Center will be fully dedicated to honeybee research, education and training, and will include a full laboratory and research apiary to focus on integrated management of the multiple factors affecting bee health. The Center will also provide state-of-the-art meeting and education facilities for beekeepers, growers, researchers and educators, including an interactive learning center.

Hide picture