Fewer bees, high pollination fees hurt farmers, crops

TRENTON, N.J. – With all the sophisticated technology today’s farmers use, little honeybees remain crucial, pollinating billions of dollars of fruit, vegetable and nut crops each year while collecting food for their hives.

But the number of honeybees and managed beehives is down so much that production of pollinated plants has fallen by about a third in the last two years from the usual $15 billion per year.

“I’ve heard people complaining about bee shortages all over the country,” said Kevin Hackett, head of the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s research program for bees and pollination. He said 15 years ago, “there were twice as many hives as there are now.”

Today, commercial beekeepers manage 2.5 million U.S. colonies, or artificial wood-and-screen box hives, with roughly 65,000 bees each. The big drop in the honeybee population the last several years is mostly due to the parasitic varroa mite destroying more than half of some beekeepers’ hives and wiping out most wild honeybees.

Commercial beekeepers, crunched by huge bee losses and rising costs for fuel and chemicals to kill varroa mites, have boosted the fees they charge farmers to rent honeybees.

AP