Honeybees will die out in Britain within a decade as
virulent diseases and parasites spread through the nation's hives,
experts have warned.
Whole colonies of bees are already being wiped out,
with current methods of pest control unable to stop the problem.
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Disease is killing off Britain’s
honeybees
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The British Beekeepers Association (BBKA) said that
if the crisis continued, honeybees would disappear completely from
Britain by 2018, causing "calamitous" economic and environmental
problems.
It called on the Government to restart shelved
research programmes and to fund new ones to try to save the
insects.
Tim Lovett, the association's president, said: "The
situation has become insupportable and the Government is unwilling
to take steps to avoid disaster.
"We're increasingly unable to cope with threats as
they arise. No bees means a huge cost to agriculture, without
touching on the ecological and environmental issues. We're facing
calamitous results."
Last year, more than 11 per cent of all beehives
inspected were wiped out, although losses were higher in some
areas.
In London, about 4,000 hives - two-thirds of the bee
colonies in the capital - were estimated to have died over last
winter. Of the eight colonies inspected so far this year, all have
been wiped out.
The losses are being blamed on Colony Collapse
Disorder, a disease that has severely affected bee populations in
America and Europe, and a resistant form of Varroa destructor, a
parasitic mite that affects bees.
The decline in honeybees is risking the
sustainability of home-grown food. They pollinate more than 90 of
the flowering crops we rely on for food. They are estimated to
contribute more than £1 billion a year to the national economy yet
the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra),
spends an average of only £200,000 a year on research to protect
them.
The BBKA will this week launch a campaign aimed at
forcing ministers to take the plight of the bee more seriously, and
to spend the £8 million over the next five years which it believes
is essential to guarantee its survival.
At their annual meeting held earlier this month, the
association's 11,200 members voted unanimously to condemn the
Government's position.
At a showdown meeting, between Lord Rooker, the
farming minister, and the BBKA last month, the minister refused to
increase the spending, even though in November, he appeared to admit
the severity of the threat, when he said: "If we do not do anything,
the chances are that in 10 years' time we will not have any
honeybees."
Mr Lovett added: "Defra has been alerted, but
chooses to take no action. If nothing happens, we may not even have
to wait 10 years."
Professor Francis Ratniek, a bee expert at Sheffield
University, said: "If there was to be a bee collapse the effect on
Britain would be huge.
"In Britain we haven't had our fair share of bee
research funds and research into bee disease has decreased just as
the threat to colonies is increasing. A complete die-off is a worst
case scenario." |