Ten million research fund for bee health must be targeted

The £10 million research initiative to tackle bee and pollinator decline announced by Defra today, Tuesday, must be targeted accurately to identify and solve the real problems facing the key pollinators of crops, according to the NFU.

Defra Secretary of State Hilary Benn said the £10 million fund will give researchers the chance to identify the causes of the decline in bee numbers and that will enable Defra take the right action to help.

However the NFU believes it is essential that the new funding is not spent, and ultimately wasted, on well intentioned research into pollinating insects that are eventually shown to be of relatively little importance in terms of crop pollination.

Director of policy Martin Haworth said: "The industry has been asking Government and other funding bodies for many months to increase the level of funding for research into the problems affecting honey bee colonies. The new funding announced today is a positive move and has come about as a direct result of this lobbying and the increased awareness of the problems facing honey bees.

"The magnitude of these problems has always been set in the context of the £200 million annual value of UK crop pollination provided by honey bees. It follows that the logical approach to using this new funding is to confirm the contribution of honey bees and any other key pollinating insects to crop production, and then to allocate the funding accordingly to address the actual problems faced by the key pollinators.


"Meanwhile, considering the accepted importance of honey bees to crop production, and the severity of the immediate health problems facing honey bees, a significant proportion of this funding needs to be allocated straight away to tackling honey bee decline.

"The NFU will continue to work the Bee Farmers’ Association, and with other bee industry partners, to ensure this extra funding is used to tackle the most important issues facing honey bees and other key crop pollinators."