April 8, 2016
By Natasha Geiling
Bonnie Raindrop (click here) has been beekeeping for just nine years, but that’s been more than enough time to see the precipitous decline in bee populations that has been plaguing Maryland. Last year, according to the USDA, Maryland beekeepers lost 61 percent of their honeybee populations, which is two times higher than the national average. Over the last five or so years, Raindrop herself has witnessed crushing losses in her own hives, fluctuating between 50 and 100 percent.
Which is why Raindrop is so happy that the Maryland legislature has started to take notice. Thursday night, the Maryland House and Senate agreed upon and jointly passed a final version of the Maryland Pollinator Protection Act, which would eliminate consumer use of neonicotinoids, a widely-used class of pesticides that has been shown to negatively impact honeybees. If the bill — which now goes to the desk of Maryland Governor Larry Hogan (R) — is enacted into law, it would make Maryland the first state in the country to codify such protection for honeybees at a statewide level.
“Maryland’s [pollinator] losses are really staggering,” Tiffany Finck-Haynes, a campaigner at Friends of the Earth, told ThinkProgress, noting that “sustainable” bee losses are considered to be around 10 to 15 percent of a colony — significantly less than what Maryland has been experiencing....
...Economic Value (click here)
Honey bees are the most economically valuable pollinator worldwide, and many high-value crops such as almonds and broccoli are entirely reliant upon pollination services by commercial beekeepers. Globally, 9.5% of the total economic value of agricultural production for human consumption comes from insect pollination – in 2005, this amounted to just under $200 billion.
The value of crops pollinated by bees in the U.S. alone was estimated at $14.6 billion in 2000 – that figure has since grown....
Honey bees are the most economically valuable pollinator worldwide, and many high-value crops such as almonds and broccoli are entirely reliant upon pollination services by commercial beekeepers. Globally, 9.5% of the total economic value of agricultural production for human consumption comes from insect pollination – in 2005, this amounted to just under $200 billion.
The value of crops pollinated by bees in the U.S. alone was estimated at $14.6 billion in 2000 – that figure has since grown....
