More On Bayer Bee Care

Seven years ago the U.S. Senate's unanimous approval and designation of a week in June as "National Pollinator Week" marked a necessary step toward addressing the urgent issue of declining pollinator populations. Becky Langer, Manager of the North American Bee Care Program says Bayer is committed to discovering the cause of the decline in honeybees.

LANGER: Most individuals or experts in the field will agree that it's a multi-faceted problem that the honeybees are facing. That ranges from what could be pesticides. It could even be pesticides that are applied into the hive. It's nutrition. It's habitat areas. It's diseases, bacteria and the number one factor is the varroa mite.

Langer says that Bayer is interested in working together to come up with a solution.

LANGER: We can achieve solutions if we all work together and so we have to bring together any of the stakeholders that have that interest and really look at it from an industry wide perspective or community-wide perspective and not take sides and look at the difference because there's so many factors contributing to the problem.

The Bayer Bee Care Center is open to the public and gets folks of all ages touring the facility. Pollinator Week is a chance to tell an important story.

LANGER: They estimate that approximately 1/3 of the food that we eat each day is pollinated by the honeybee. It's important to realize right now that even though we do hear about decline's occurring there are honeybees to pollinate the food supply, but there is a problem. We do have to recognize that there's a decline so we have to work to promote those solutions.

That's today's Fruit Grower Report. I'm Greg Martin on the Ag Information Network.