Imagine a world without, apples, almonds, blueberries, cherries, avocados, cucumbers, grapefruits, and onions. This is just a glimpse of some produce that would vanish without the support of our honey bees. We must make protecting honey bees a priority, before we have no chance to help.

Our human population depends on bees unconsciously, but once we realize the impact they have on our lives, we can be more involved in helping. Without a large, healthy bee population, most foods we rely on would disappear.

One Whole Foods store recently, “emptied its shelves of all the products that depend on bee pollination. The produce section was barren. The store lost half of all its products” (Ellis and Pica).

Whole Foods devotion to honey bee protection represents how seriously nationwide leaders feel about their existence. Bees have an impact on everyone's lives, no matter your profession. Food industry workers, gardeners, bee keepers, and mostly farmers are affected.

Some researchers say, “cross-pollination helps at least 30 percent of the world’s crops and 90 percent of our wild plants to thrive. Without bees to spread seeds, many plants—including food crops—would die off”(Sass p.2).

By increasing the honey bee population there are more bees to pollinate our food, therefore more successful food production rates,. Also, if the bee population were to maintain a healthy number, more jobs could be available to those who are affected by their presence.  

If we don't start to help alter our daily lives in some way, these insects will vanish, and so will our food. We are all at fault for their suffering, but we also have the power to restore their health. Think about a world where your children, or grandchildren won't be able to enjoy the beautiful nature that you can today, or eat amazing produce that you take for granted now? This is all because our human population is uneducated on this topic, and people don't relize the effect these creatures have on our lives.

Scientists and researchers have found many statistics to prove that saving our honey bees is necessary step to take. Seventy of the world's top 100 crops are pollinated by bees – and those foods feed 90 percent of mankind. The honeybee loss rate simply can't continue. Without honeybees, we won't have food. That's a sting that everyone will feel.

This author writes, “honey bees — wild and domestic — perform about 80 percent of all pollination worldwide. A single bee colony can pollinate 300 million flowers each day. Grains are primarily pollinated by the wind, but fruits, nuts and vegetables are pollinated by bees”(Cooksey).

Honey bees contribute nearly $20 billion to the value of U.S. crop production. It's also estimated that there are about 2.7 million bee colonies in the U.S. today, two-thirds of which travel the country each year pollinating crops and producing honey and beeswax. The California almond industry requires approximately 1.8 million colonies of honey bees in order to adequately pollinate nearly one million acres of almond orchards. These bees are vital to our existence, meaning we need to take action, or the results will be devastating to our nutrition.   

Some people might say that trying to save only the honey bees is not effective enough. When honeybees occur in high numbers, they can push wild bees out of an area, making it harder for wild plants to reproduce. Honeybees are not a substitute for wild pollinators, so we must protect the entire bee community to achieve good quality pollination. Saving just the honey bees might not be the most effective way to restore the bee populations, however it is necessary to keep our food industries going, and then we can figure out ways to restore the whole bee population.

Overall, we must make protecting honey bees a priority to make sure our food industries keep thriving. To help their population numbers increase we can ban the most dangerous pesticides, protect pollinator health by preserving wild habitat, and restore ecological agriculture.

Recent evidence suggests, “that human activity—including land development, electromagnetic pollution, and use of neonicotinoid pesticides—is making it even harder for honey bees to reproduce, to the peril of the species” (Brown).

By making sure we are conscious of our actions, we can restore the honey bee population and have a healthy ecosystem. With your help by buying local bee products made on local farms, our bees just might be okay.