Washington Whispers: Feds Are Split on Funding for the Honey Bee Crisis
Reader Comments
Agriculutre Security
Having a robust and active Honey Bee Insustry is vital to our National Security. The USDA already projects growth of food imports for fresh fruits and vegetables approching 40% in the next few years and that the US will be a net food importer in 50 years. Food security is a National Strategic Security issue unless as the good Secretary and many others do not care where food comes from. If we cannot pollinate our own crops than that production is lost. We are already importing most of our oil based energy supplies as gas for my car approaches $4.00 per gallon. Now we are going down the path to having the food we eat everyday coming from others who can dicatate supply and prices. Doesn't sound like a plan to me. wars have been fought over less.
Beekeepers Need Research Now
The US beekeeping industry is being challenged as never before. With the need to have more of our farms pollinated by managed honey bee colonies, we need substantial research to stop this colony collapse disorder and the deadly parasitic mites now before it destroys a vital part of the US food chain.
Mr. Secretary, if you think research is expensive, just try going to a grocery store and buying only items that do not need honeybee pollination (honeybees pollinate over 130 verities of nuts, fruits and vegetables). What you will end up with is a diet of corn, wheat and mushrooms. To have the true bounty of the garden, you must have honeybee pollination.
As a third generation beekeeper, I’m behooved to see your statement regarding the unnecessary funding for research. There are hundreds of samples that have not been analyzed because of no funding, there are bees dead in the field that need to be examined but no funds are available to determine the cause of death. Is it environmental? New chemical treatment of plants? Bio-engineered plants? A new virus? Too many question and not enough research. We need research now.
There is not one state in our nation that does not have Agriculture as a vital part of its industry and economy. After you have seed, dirt, water and sunshine the next most important item you need to grow fruits and vegetables is pollination. Having a healthy and strong beekeeping industry will assure us that we never have a “Silent Spring”.
Virginia Webb
Proud to be a US Commercial Beekeeper. Clarkesville, GA
Lame Thoughts From a Lame-Duck Ag Secretary
The good news is that the House and Senate will approve the funding to continue to work on CCD regardless of how the Bush administration postures and poses.
The other good news is that the current administration will be replaced in a few hundred days, and Agriculture will have someone at the helm who funds research on agriculture, rather than cutting funds.
If Ed Schafer is an "advocate in the bee situation", this is a new and highly speculative use of the term "advocate" one to which we beekeepers have hitherto been unexposed.
Even for-profit private industry is raising money for CCD effort! It is a sad day when the Haagen-Dazs ice cream company cares more about bees and "gets it", while the Secretary of Agriculture goes all "Pollyanna" and "Dr. Pangloss" on us.
As for "this great bee guy who's tinkering away in the lab", the USDA has so far
participated in work that resulted in two published papers, the first contradicted by
the second. Details on the work done to date can be found at http://bee-quick.com/reprints.
Our bees would like your help!
I have been a commercial beekeeper for over 30 years and in that time the bee industry has has lots of problems that have threatened our bees. But beekeepers have been resillient and have kept working diligently to work through these problems with very minimal help from the government. CCD is unlike anything I have seen before and now we have asked for some help from the USDA. Beekeepers are facing "Katrina level" problems and unfortunately we are getting the same amount of help from the present administration. I encourage Secretary Schafer to reconsider his approach to funding CCD research. Please spend a little more time investigating this issue and you will find that it is not going to get any better on it's own. In real dollars spent by the USDA over the last two years, approximately $300,000 has been appropriated for extra CCD research. The "great bee guy tinkering away in his lab" needs help to solve this complex problem.
In a larger context, it is likely that CCD is much more than a "honeybee problem". We hear regular reports that wild pollinators such as wasps, bumblebees, and butterflies are also disapearing. What about the bats? They have problems also. The loss of honeybees may be just the beginning of a much larger issue. They are the "canary in the mine" telling us that something may be wrong in our environment. Mr. Secretary, please do not overlook these events. The honeybees ae telling us that something is very wrong. It is our job to decipher this message. We sure could use your help and support.
No, he's busy as a bee promoting NAIS
Interesting, isn't it that good ol' Ed says, "As for more money, he said that his department doesn't need it. "You can always try to overwhelm things with money and hopefully get a better answer. Very, very seldom do you get a better answer; you're just wasting money." Pshaw! He's overwhelming farmers with National Animal Identification System by pouring money all over it, creating a solution for a problem that does not exist.
But, I digress. Why would he want to help with CDC when USDA is so far up Monsanto's butt. You must have an inkling that CDC is caused by the DNA from GE/GMOs jumping species barrier and taking up in the yeast residing in the bee's gut. That's what causes CDC. Just another dirty little secret that USDA and Monsanto doesn't want you to know about.
Honey Bees
As a commercial beekeeper who has followed the CCD situation closely, and having spoken with most of the CCD researchers, I'm amazed at Gov. Shafer's dismissal of the problem.
Colony collapses are recurring this year, and the bee researchers have samples of bees piled up in freezers, waiting for funding to pay for the cost of analyzing them to see what is causing the problem.
Honeybees are responsible for some $20 BILLION dollars worth of crop pollination in the US each year. If the consumer wants fresh fruit, nuts, and vegetables, honeybees are a necessary part of agriculture. Pollination rentals to farmers for some crops have more than tripled due to shortage of bees--not to lack of effort by beekeepers.
Honeybees should get a share of agricultural research money, since they are important to so many crops--often moving from one to another. The researchers that I've spoken to have been putting in long hours and weekends, and have been working on a shoestring. It's time to invest some wisely-spent funds toward solving this problem for the long term.
Washington sticks it's head in the sand again
As a beekeeper I am dissapointed that Washington is going to "wish" this problem away like it does with so many others. Much our food supply depends heavily on solving CCD. Ask the Farmers who spend triple the usual amount on bees for pollenation, or the Beekeeper who loses tens of thousands of dollars each year in lost colonies of bees if this is "still" a problem. Let's just hope that progress comes from the the Beekeepers themselves, many of whom are frantically trying to develop sustainable approaches to solving CCD. Meanwhile Washington sticks it's head in sand as usual...
Sec of Agriculture
Way to go, Ed! Just what we need in Washington; practicality, knowledge, and one who knows that more money doesn't necessarily mean more honey!
Thank you, Sec. Schafer.
