Why bees are important, for us and for the Planet

The little workers who feed the world

They’re so cute that they have become the stars of children's cartoons: and if, in the human imagination, they’re considered friendly animals, there’s a reason. In actual fact, there’s more than one.

The most immediate reason is that bees make honey: this is the quintessential sweet food, so much so that since biblical times we have used the term “a land flowing with milk and honey” to describe a heavenly place. In reality, however, not all bees make honey: only domestic “honey bees” do, while many other species of bee don’t.

There is, however, another, less poetic but far more practical reason why bees are to be considered our friends: when they suck nectar from flowers, they involuntarily cover themselves with pollen, carrying it from one flower to another. They therefore make plant fertilization possible, without knowing it.

A large proportion of the world's plant species reproduce thanks to the work of pollinators, of which bees are the most important: they are responsible for 70% of the pollination of all plant species and, according to some estimates, they account for about 35% of global food production.

 

Why are bees endangered?

Bee numbers are declining globally: this is an established fact. There are no precise numbers – this is partly because they depend heavily on individual species – but from many quarters and for many years alarm has been raised about their health status.

Even more uncertain are the causes of the phenomenon. We do know, however, that human-caused factors – particularly climate change and environmental pollution – endanger the delicate ecosystems in which bees live and the biodiversity in their habitat, resulting in a reduction in their numbers. Furthermore, it would appear that the use of certain pesticides (such as neocotinoids) is particularly harmful to their health.

These threats are then compounded by natural factors such as the viruses that affect bees: the combined effect of these factors could be the real cause of their decline, along with perhaps other reasons as yet unknown.

 

What happens if bees disappear?

"If the bee disappeared from the face of the earth, then man would have only four years of life left,” said Albert Einstein. Or did he? No, he didn’t, actually.

The quote, like many of those attributed to the most famous scientist in history, is apocryphal: he never said this, nor, probably, did he think it. After all – although it is impossible to predict the consequences of such extreme scenarios – there are other pollinators that could partly fill the ecological niche that would be left by bees: mainly insects (including butterflies and wasps) but also many birds and some mammals.

There is also another reason why the phrase attributed to Einstein is wrong: although the number of bees is declining, it is not true that they are generally endangered (unlike other insects). Some (wild) species are at greater risk than others, while for domestic species extinction is not a plausible scenario.

Still, the decline of bees is worrying: if a third of the available food was lost, it would be a disaster of unprecedented proportions. Even a more realistic crop decline – of between 5% and 8%, according to some estimates – would have serious consequences for the global economy and, to some extent, for the food supply.

 

How we can protect bees

Several international initiatives have been launched in order to protect bees.

In particular, in 2018 the European Union began a number of projects supported by the most advanced technologies, including artificial intelligence.

Many companies have also shown considerable sensitivity to the issue, with initiatives to encourage beekeeping and protect bee health, often in collaboration with research organizations or the beekeepers themselves.

People can also play their part: for example, in South America, some indigenous communities have dedicated themselves to breeding different species of native bees, so as to promote their survival and at the same time, thanks to their pollination work, counter deforestation. Not only that, initiatives of this kind help strengthen the ecological awareness of individuals and their sense of belonging to the ecosystem: this is increasingly important.

At an individual level, anyone can help protect bee health, even without having to become a beekeeper, with a few simple steps:

• When gardening, avoid using pesticides that have been shown to be harmful to bees;
• Buy products from farms that have excelled in bee protection;
• Support bee health associations financially, choosing those that are genuinely disinterested over those that just want to sell honey;
• More generally, any action, however small, aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions into the atmosphere – and thus in particular anything related to the energy transition – can help in protecting the climate and thus bee habitats around the world.