“One in three bites of food can be attributed to a pollinator”.
An overlooked ‘ecosystem service’, pollination, is essential to humanity. In Africa pollinators are primarily wild insects that travel between farms and natural habitat, and are extremely vulnerable to habitat loss and destruction.
Pollinators intimately link wild species with basic human livelihoods. The relationships between insects and flowers are at once ancient, beautifully intricate and correspondingly fragile.
Saving pollinators justifies conservation of small species-rich habitats, such as forest patches and contributes to food security and rural livelihoods of the communities living close to nature/alongside critically endangered species.
More on pollinators soon!
The picture below is of a carpenter bee pollinating pigeonpea, a widespread crop grown in both Africa and Asia and an excellent source of minerals and healthy protein!
Isn’t it amazing that we wouldn’t be able to eat the food we love without these pollinators? If it weren’t for midges pollinating cacao trees, we wouldn’t have chocolate! How mind-boggling is that?
-ESC
Do have any ideas about what’s sending US bees into drastic decline? Is it to do with wild habitat destruction and transporting bees great distances to farms/orchards?