Background to the campaign

Why is the WI campaigning on honey bee health?
The decline of honey bees represents a major loss in biodiversity, as honey bees are not only responsible for producing honey, but play a vital role in pollinating plants for food and other crops.
Approximately a third of our human diet is directly dependent on bees, making them central to our existence. In the natural environment, bees are also responsible for pollinating around 90% of the wild plants which produce seeds and fruits on which birds and wild animals depend, thus making them even more central to our world's existence.
Currently, honey bees are coming under threat from pests and diseases for which treatments are not fully understood or are ineffective. Many bee keepers have experienced the complete destruction of their hives from such diseases, whilst the UK is losing its bee population at around 30% a year (up from just 6% in 2003). The UK has 250 species of bees, three of which have already become nationally extinct.
We urgently need to discover what is happening to our honeybee colonies and what we can do to reverse their decline and have a thriving, buzzing countryside once again.
Background to the issue
In 2009, the Government has attempted to address some of the concerns around bee health by implementing Bee Base, a database of all bee keepers in the UK, and providing the National Bee Unit with more funding for its inspections and advice work. The focus on inspections and beekeeping practices may go some way to helping the decline in bees, however the resolution seeks support for research into bee health specifically.
In April 2009, the Government and its funding partners announced a £10 million fund over 5 years for research into the threat facing all pollinators.
After months of pressure from WI members,bee keepers and campaigners the grants for this pollinator research were announced in June 2010. Two of the projects to be funded deal exclusively with honey bees, and honey bees feature in six of the other projects to be researched.
Research will now be undertaken into issues like the effect of mite control chemicals and pesticides on honey bee learning, and the varroa mite.Honey bees also feature in projects to look at crop pollination in the UK, possible links between wildflower and pollinator decline, pollinators in urban areas and bee nutrition.
More information about the research projects can be found here.
We must now ensure that the results of the research are publicly available as soon as possible to allow beekeepers to make use of them in practical beekeeping.
We also need urgent action throughout society to help honey bees thrive - by planting bee friendly plants and supporting local beekeepers.