What stays in your shopping cart if pollinators disappear?

Apples, blueberries, onions, cabbages, cauliflowers, cocoa beans, coffee, pears, almonds, mustard, sunflowers, rapeseed, radish, carrots, alfalfa, cucumbers. What is common in the above species of food and vegetables is the fact that their yield depends on pollination. 70 per cent of the 100 most common utility plants are pollinated by insects and other animals. About 30-35 per cent of the food of humankind depends on the success of animal pollination. However, when we think of the multiplicity of vegetable raw materials and the quality of our food, this proportion is significantly higher.

Documents of the IPBES conference are available here.„The health of pollinators is directly related to our own well-being” – according to biologist Vera Lucia Imperatriz Fonseca, a professor of the University at São Paulo. Fonseca was co-chair at the Biodiversity and Ecosystem Service Intergovernmental Congress (IPBES) held in Kuala Lumpur which ended on February 28 with the international organization publishing its very first report focusing specifically on pollinators.

Wild bees are of key importance when it comes to pollination. Species like the Stelis annulata pictured here above, are largely threatened by extinction in Europe according to the 2015 report of the World Union of Nature Reserve (IUCN). As for 56.7 per cent of wild bees, we do not have sufficient quantity or quality data. (Photo: IUCN/David Genoud)

The number of pollinator species threatened with extinction keeps increasing and many times these threats can be directly linked to human activities. As a result, the lives of millions may be at risk since a multitude of fruits, seeds, plant oils etc. are essential raw materials in the food industry as well as vital sources of vitamins and trace elements.

What would happen if the number of polinators were to decrease significantly? The most likely result would be that the fruit and vegetables on offer in food stores would be halved in many places. As a direct result of the decrease of crop yields the risk of under-nourishment would increase. Furthermore, we must also not overlook the fact that coffee or cocoa are extremely important sources of income in many developing countries as the IPBES’s report stresses.

In the report entitled „Pollination, pollinators, and food production - a thematic appraisal” experts of IPBES also offer some suggestions as to how this element of critical importance to the global ecosystem could be protected. The report’s novelty lies not only in a summary of essays and researches related to the area of expertise but that it has also incorporated the experiences and results accumulated by communities which have traditionally dealt with crop and plant production for centuries. At the international conference accepting the report, Hungary was represented by András Báldi, director-in-chief of MTA’s Ecological Research Centre as well as members of the staff of the Ministry of Agriculture; as to the wording of the report, one of the leading authors was Anikó Kovács-Hostyánszki, a researcher of MTA’s Ecosystem Service (in the Lendület program) of the Ecological Research Centre.

How many species are affected by the negative processes marked by IPBES?

Science keeps track of around 20 thousand species of wild bees alone. Besides bees, many butterflies, wasps, flies and other insects as well as bats and birds take part in pollination. According to IPBES calculations, between 235-577 billion US$ of the whole World’s annual food production directly depends on pollinators. To cite one example: the raw material needed to produce chocolate is the seed of the cacao tree. The financial value of a yearly yield of cacao trees is roughly 5.7 billion US$; in this specific case it is gall midges that are responsible for the plant's pollination.

Agricultural production depending on pollinators has tripled in the last 50 years, even though the yield of plants requiring pollinators is less stable than of those that do not require a proxy to achieve pollination.

Pollinators are also essential for crops such as cotton but they also play a pivotal role in influencing the yields of palm oils (a vital biofuel foodstock), as well as some medicinal herbs. In the IPBES report experts emphasize that some 90 per cent of wild floral plants also require pollination which has a much larger chance of succeeding if both wild and domestic bees have a chance to participate in pollination.

Threats on pollinators

Some 16 per cent of vertebrate pollinators are threatened with extinction worldwide. Although no similar global evaluation has been made about insects, research reports have found a marked threat, especially in the case of bees and butterflies. Over 40 per cent of insect pollinators are threatened by local dangers.

„Their numbers are decreased by changes in agricultural land use, the adoption of intensive agricultural procedures and pesticides, the appearance of invasive species, diseases, pests as well as issues relating to climate change”

– says Sir Robert Watson, vice-president of IPBES. The number of pollinators in the wild has been shown to be decreasing in North-Western-Europe and North-America. There are many unsettling results from the rest of the world but research results are still too vague for large scale conclusions to be drawn according to the IPBES report. Researchers say that pesticides, including those containing neo-nicotinoid as their active ingredient, the use of which is restricted in the EU, endanger pollinators worldwide, moreover their long term effects are as of yet unknown. A pioneering study conducted in farms claims that anti-infestation materials, including neo-nicotinoid, are detrimental to wild bees without any such clear results regarding domestic bees.

The report also covers genetically modified plants (GMO). Such crops usually tolerate pesticides rather well, therefore these compounds can be used in concentrations that will definitely exterminate weeds in the crop's vicinity. By doing so, however we will also be diminishing the nourishment pollinators need for their own survival. Experts point out however, that we know very little about GMO-cultivation’s indirect, unfatal effects upon pollinators, therefore this factor is not listed among key aspects of the risk assessment.

What can be done to protect them?

According to the report the solution lies clearly in making agriculture more sustainable. Experts usually propose the following concrete measures:

• Farmlands should contain sections covered with wild flowers.
• Producers should keep or even boost the diversity of the habitats of pollinators; they should use traditional agricultural methods in supplying habitats with mosaic shaped pollination.
• Farmers should reduce the use of pesticides and look for new technologies to reduce the spread of chemicals.
• They should also look for improving the conditions of bee-keeping (including action against pathogens and a more efficient regulation on bee-keeping).