“It’s a heart of it,” says Theo Roozendaal from Berkhout while holding hundreds of dead bees in his hands. That the honeybee is doing badly has been known for a while, but according to him it is very extreme this year. “There are beekeepers who have no bee population left at all. That while the insect is extremely important. Eighty percent of all our food crops depend on pollination by insects.”
Of course there is the varroa mite, a parasite that adheres to bees and pathogens. This mite was originally to be found in Asia, but has been joined by globalization to other continents. Yet, according to Roozendaal, the mite is not the only culprit. The beekeeper opens the attack on floriculture that uses pesticides.
Pure profit
“There are already plenty of pesticides forbidden, but they are still found in the surface water,” says Roozendaal. And that water is just where the bee will drink. He takes the poison to the basket with disastrous consequences. “Get to know me a farmer. If he has paid for something, he uses it too. Even if it is illegal, they just do it. It’s about purely profit.”
A significant accusation that agricultural and horticultural organization LTO Noord is strongly rejected. According to Trude Buysman, gardeners are extensively checked for the use of illegal pesticides. Moreover, according to her there is none at all evidence That gardeners are the cause of bee mortality. “Scientific research has shown that there is no link between bee mortality and crop protection. We desperately need it, then you don’t want to kill them anyway.”
Beekeeper Theo Roozendaal shows his dead bee colonies (text continues under the video):