This is the next stage in the spin concerning CCD, the disappearing bees. Now we accept their disappearance and play down its significance:

“If pollinators were to vanish, it would reduce total food production by only about 6 percent”

This is highly questionable if not downright mendacious and the authors use a simple mechanical model failing to take into account the interdependence of all environmental factors. Contrast these authors claims with the viewpoint of Andrew Goldsworthy:

While the bulk of our staple foods come from wind-pollinated cereals that do not rely directly on the bees, these do not support the nitrogen-fixing bacteria needed for sustainable agriculture.  Without bee pollinated crops (e.g. legumes) that host these bacteria, we will have to rely on artificial nitrogen fertilisers, which are either mined from limited natural sources or manufactured from the nitrogen of the air. Both are heavily dependent on fossil fuels and are not sustainable. Without them even our wind-pollinated crops will be decimated, which will lead to famine and mass starvation.

In addition, cereals do not provide an adequate balanced diet. In particular, they are almost totally lacking in vitamin C, which is essential to prevent scurvy.

It is simply sinister to hear so many fruit and vegetables, dependent on pollination described as “luxury foods”. According to a motion put through the European parliament

Three quarters of food production (76%) is dependent on bees and 84% of vegetables grown in Europe depend on pollination.

We also, of course, find the implicit Malthusian angle.

The paradox is that our demand for these foods endangers the wild bees that help make their cultivation possible

This is a variation of the Malthusian thesis that food supplies can never keep up with growing population

This is the  mantra of the Anglo-American elite and relates to what has always been their greatest obsession: the culling of humanity.

New Observer

27th March, 2010

In the past five years, as the phenomenon known as colony-collapse disorder has spread across the United States and Europe, causing the disappearance of whole colonies of domesticated honeybees, many people have come to fear that our food supply is in peril. The news this week that a Department of Agriculture survey found that American honeybees had died in great numbers this winter can only add to such fears.

The truth, fortunately, is not nearly so dire. But it is more complicated.

Read the rest of this entry »

“Under normal condition you have 10 percent winter losses.. this year there are 30, 40 to 50 percent losses.”

This is looking catastrophic and yet these tossers calling themselves scientists continue to talk crap. Here, unsurprisingly we have a malthusian angle:

“The world population growth is in a sense the reason for pollinators’ decline,”

Never mind! This will soon correct itself if the scientists continue to be “stumped” and mysteriously fail to follow the most promising lead of all.

Data from the US Department of Agriculture show a 29 percent drop in beehives in 2009, following a 36 percent decline in 2008 and a 32 percent fall in 2007.

This affects not only honey production but around 15 billion dollars worth of crops that depend on bees for pollination.

Scientists call the phenomenon “colony collapse disorder” that has led to the disappearance of millions of adult bees and beehives and occurred elsewhere in the world including in Europe.

Researchers have looked at viruses, parasites, insecticides, malnutrition and other environmental factors but have been unable to pinpoint a specific cause for the population decline.

The rough winter in many parts of the United States will likely accentuate the problem, says Jeff Pettis, lead researcher at Department of Agriculture’s Bee Research Laboratory in Beltsville, Maryland.

Winter figures will be published in April. But preliminary estimates already indicate losses of 30 to 50 percent, said David Mendes, president of the American Beekeeping Federation.

“There are a lot of beekeepers who are in trouble” he said.

“Under normal condition you have 10 percent winter losses.. this year there are 30, 40 to 50 percent losses.”

He said the phenomenon probably results from a combination of factors but that the increased use of pesticides appears to be a major cause.

“I don’t put my bees in Florida because the last couple of years there has been tremendous increase in pesticide use in the orange crop to fight a disease,” he said.

“It’s a bacterium and the only way to control this disease is to use pesticide… a few years ago they did not use any pesticide at all.”

He said that pesticide use “has changed dramatically” and has made beekeeping “more challenging.”

Research conducted in 23 US states and Canada and published in the Public Library of Science journal found 121 different pesticides in 887 samples of bees, wax, pollen and other elements of hives, lending credence to the notion of pesticides as a key problem.

Pettis said the finding of pesticide residue is “troubling.”

“It might not be the only factor but it’s a contributing factor,” he said.

The best thing to help bees, he said its “to try to limit habitat destruction,” leaving more natural areas in agriculture and in cities such so honey beescan have “a diverse natural environment.”

Ironically, he said the problem stems from expansion of agriculture to feed the world. But in destroying bee populations, that can hurt crop production.

“The world population growth is in a sense the reason for pollinators’ decline,” he said.

“Because we need to produce more and more food to feed the world and we grow crops in larger fields. A growing world means growing more food and to do that we need pollinators. And the fact that the world is continuing to grow is the driving force behind the habitat destruction.”