Weekend thoughts on Bees

Stephen Colbert on the plight of bees:


Speaking of Einstein, one of our commenters (hector, who is a font of links) points us to this article on the beehive–food supply connection:

Almost a third of global farm output depends on animal pollination, largely by honey bees.

These foods provide 35pc of our calories, most of our minerals, vitamins, and anti-oxidants, and the foundations of gastronomy. Yet the bees are dying – or being killed – at a disturbing pace.

The article is posed as a he-said, she-said piece, with Rabobank, a Dutch-based "agri-business lender," taking the "don't be hard on business" side:

Rabobank said US bee colonies were shrinking even before CCD struck because cheap imports of Asian honey had undercut US hives. Note the parallel with the demise of the US rare earth metals industry, put out of business when China flooded the world with cheaper supplies in the 1990s. This is what happens when free trade is managed carelessly [author's comment, not the bank's].

Rabobank has an interesting business model, by the way; they are set up "as a federation of local credit unions, which offer services to the local markets [where the] central organisation is the daughter organisation of the local branches, rather than the parent organisation". Not your obvious patented conglomerate villain; nevertheless, a pro-business spokescorp, for obvious reasons.

One of real villains may be pesticides, some of which are hard on bees and their nervous systems. That use, and that problem, is world-wide. The article is excellent on these details, than adds this:

Leaked documents from the Environmental Protection Agency confirm that clothianidin used on corn seed is "highly toxic", may pose a "long-term risk" to bees, and that previous tests were flawed.

Critics alleged a cover-up: Rabobank said we should be careful not to vilify agro-industry. The world needs food and fertilizer companies to keep finding ways to raise crop yields, if we are to feed over 70m extra mouths each year, and meet the demands of Asia's diet revolution, offset water scarcity in China and India, and divert a great chunk of the US, Argentine, and EU grain harvest into bio-fuels for cars.

All true statements. Rabobank wants "step change" with "curbs on pesticide use during in daylight hours". In truth, all business just wants the money to keep flowing — after all, their business is ... business. Fair enough.

But the world needs an effective result, regardless of who takes the biggest hit. Otherwise we'll all take that hit, the poor disproportionately, as they starve to death; the wealthy as they pay more for that extra grass-fed steak.

Apian atrophy is a more immediate threat than global warming, and can be solved, yet has barely risen onto the policy radar screen. ... Einstein was not always wrong.

There are so many ways the world could break down into god-awful fighting. Food supply is one of them. And it's always the same question, isn't it — profits, or people?

Happy foraging.

GP