A Strategy for Healthy Bees..
Published Mar 9, 2009
Defra today published its plan for “protecting & improving the health of honey bees in England & Wales”. This document is the result of the consultation process on the Bee Health Strategy undertaken by DEFRA last year, and to which the BBKA made considerable input.
Following review by the Minister the original document has been drastically shortened and highlights five key areas of activity including, “To ensure that sound science underpins bee health policy and its implementation” and “To get everyone to work together on bee health”, with the overall aim of confronting pests and diseases, promoting good bee husbandry and providing effective bio-security. The BBKA has long stressed that research, based on sound science, is vital to understanding the threats that face the UK bee population, and has recently published its programme “Honey Bee Health Research Concepts”, which details the work needed to find answers to the current problems facing bees and beekeepers.
Defra’s plan emphasises the importance of the education and training of beekeepers on which healthy bee stocks depend and all that that implies for pollination of food and the wild environment. As an educational charity, the BBKA undertakes a wide range of educational activities for beginners through to experts and offers a comprehensive examination system. Part of the new money recently announced by Defra for honey bee health is to be directed towards education and the BBKA is keen to work closely with the National Bee Unit (NBU) to ensure the most cost effective use of these funds.
The BBKA notes the major emphasis placed in the plan on encouraging beekeepers to register on Bee-Base the NBU’s register of beekeepers. This was also referred to extensively in the National Audit Office report into beekeeping published last week. We are not convinced that this is an answer to the disease challenges that we face, which will be better approached through research where the money involved is more urgently needed.
Tim Lovett (BBKA President), following Defra’s launch presentation said:
“Defra is clearly taking the bee health issue seriously and we hope that we may now look forward to a healthy and productive collaboration in prioritising the work to be done. We are very concerned that the inevitably limited funds available for honey bees are not diverted from the vital research tasks to be undertaken and for example poured into updating a database, which in itself holds no answers to our problems.'