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Bee Health Issues Buzzing In Corporate Boardrooms
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AP
Farmer Scott Hunter's almond trees are exploding into a
froth of pink and white blossoms that will eventually bear more than one ton of
nuts intended for trail mix, cereals, pastries and ice cream—but only if each
bloom is visited by a honey bee.
That's why concern about recent threats to the
health of honey bees, whose fertile touch is behind one-third of what we eat,
is spreading beyond farms and into boardrooms of companies like Haagen-Dazs and
Burt's Bees.
Berries, fruits and nuts that lend flavor to
about 28 of Haagen-Dazs's ice cream flavors depend on the insects for pollination.
The company, owned by Vevey, Switzerland-based Nestle SA, uses one million
pounds of almonds alone in their products.
But in the last year, beekeepers lost 30
percent of the approximately 2.5 million managed colonies to diseases,
according to the U.S Department of Agriculture.
Concern for the state of honey bees and its
potential impact on the food industry led the premium ice-cream maker to launch
a campaign intended to raise $250,000 for research into what's ailing the honey
bees, said Katty Pien, brand director of Haagen-Dazs in the United States.
"We want to avert a crisis," Pien said.
The campaign will disseminate information on ice cream
cartons,
as well as in television and print ads, about honey bees' contribution
to agriculture. Money raised through the sales of honey bee-dependent flavors
will be donated to researchers at the University
of California, Davis,
and Pennsylvania State University.
For now, Haagen-Dazs is not planning to pull
back any flavors or increase prices, but will "re-examine" the issue
if the population of bees continues to be impacted, Pien said.
Natural personal care products maker Burt's
Bees launched its own campaign in November, timed with the release of "Bee
Movie," starring Jerry Seinfeld. Burt's produced a public service announcement
on Colony Collapse Disorder, the phenomenon leading bees to abandon their
hives, and also donated money to researchers at The Honeybee Health Improvement
Project.
Growers have known for years that bees were
facing increasing threats as the price of renting a beehive jumped each spring,
from $40 a hive in 2000 to $140 this season.
Like most commercial fruit, nut and vegetable
growers, Hunter rents bee hives every year to make sure his crops are
pollinated. Price hikes have driven up
his production costs considerably.
But shoppers haven't noticed a significant
price hike in foods dependent on bee pollination because the food market is
global, and there are dozens of factors affecting the prices of commodities like
almonds.
Still, groups such as the Almond Board of
California have stepped up their efforts in the field. In 2005 the group, which
represents the farmers producing 80 percent of the world's supply of the nuts,
created a Bee Task Force to facilitate cooperation with bee keepers.
They've also invested about $200,000 a year,
for a total of about $1.4 million, in bee research.
Campaigns such as Haagen-Dazs's may help raise
awareness among consumers of the important role bees play in agriculture, which
hopefully will lead to more funds for research, said Richard Waycott, Almond
Board president and CEO.
"It could help people become more aware of
how food is grown, and how difficult it is," said Waycott. "There are
lots of creatures and people out there doing things every day to put food on
your plate."
(© 2009 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)
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