A study carried out by scientists at the English University of Reading and published in the journal Ecology Letters , suggests that pollinating insects, such as bees, can help mitigate supply problems and market disturbances that cause price spikes to world level by keeping the food supply stable . The researchers found that there was 32% less variation in the yield of plants visited by bees and other pollinators than those grown without them.
The benefits of pollinating insects on crop yields are well known. However, the role they play in its stability was not very clear. Something that is key in raising or lowering prices.
“Our findings suggest that preserving pollinators provides a double benefit, reducing fluctuations in the food supply , as well as increasing supplies in the first place,” said Dr. Jake Bishop, a crop sciences researcher at the University of Reading who has led the research: “Pollinators are especially important in the production of fruit and vegetable crops . About half of the experiments we analyzed tested the effect of real populations of pollinators on real crop fields, so our results illustrate the benefits that pollinators currently provide.”
This study is a meta-analysis combining the results of more than 200 previous experiments comparing crop yields with and without insect pollination. Scientists have focused on three crop species that are important and representative worldwide: apple, bean and rapeseed.
The research has analyzed the effects of pollination on the stability of the yield of an individual plant, of a field and of larger areas. What happened was that insect pollination made yields more alike between flowers on a plant, between individual plants, between areas within fields, or between fields.
The researchers believe that the stabilizing effect of pollination is produced by a ceiling effect , that is, the increase in production thanks to pollination reaches a limit due to the limitations of other resources that support crop growth. These limitations would be, for example, a lower amount of nutrients in the soil or a worse access to water. This creates a higher, more stable baseline where performance fluctuates less.
The current increase in food prices is the result of a series of factors, such as the high price of oil and the reduced capacity of Ukraine to export its products (it is considered the breadbasket of Europe) after being invaded by Russia. Ukraine is the world’s largest exporter of sunflower oil, providing about 10% of world wheat exports.
The previous spike in food prices that took place in 2007-2008 across the globe (they practically doubled) may have been due, in part, to losses in wheat production, which represented a loss of approximately 4.6 % Worldwide.
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Referencia: Bishop, J. et. al. 2022. Animal pollination increases stability of crop yield across spatial scales. Ecology Letters. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/ele.14069
