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Food & Agriculture

The dangers of declining bee populations

I have heard news about a decrease of bees populations in many areas of the world, like in North America.
The causes of this decline should be the pollution produced by industrial pollution and, mainly, by pesticides used for agriculture, that kills or weaken bees in their activity of collecting pollen from flowers, more in cultivated fields but also in zones not close to coltures, because the poisons we spread so easily can "travel" with winds and superficial waters.
Bees become to be less fertile and then they weaken and die.

Another cause of their decline is the diffusion in North and South America and China of trans-genic colture that bees and other insects can't pollinate, as shown by some researches on the field. So, there's also a reduction of the living area of bees, caused by these "Frankenstein's coltures", never occurred before, because, as we know, bees normally populated either the wild and the cultivated zones everywhere.

This reduction of bees number can have serious consequences, chained the one to the other.
Firstly, their pollinating activity, so important for plants reproduction, decreases, making more difficult the natural and quick regeneration of natural vegetation.

If this decline became more widespread, the biological richness of many regions will be reduced and some plant species, the most dependent from bees pollination, could disappear, because wind is clearly not enough to grant a sufficient contact of pollen (the vegetable equivalent of animals' sperm) with the female flowers.

Also humans could be damaged by this decline, firstly the HONEY producers that were the first to notice and suffer for it.
Bees seem to die not directly for acute or chronic poisoning, but also for infective diseases caused by their decreased immune resistance, always caused by pesticides and industrial waste residuals, there are not other causes; maybe, just a sort of bees' AIDS.
The difficult task will be to discover what are the most dangerous chemicals for bees.
How many dead bees autopsies will be necessary for this?

Honey production risks to be very reduced and, consequently, much more expensive.
I like very much honey, but I have to admit that this is just the least of problems, created by this decline.

Learn more about this author, Aldo Bonincontro.
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