In a follow up to a previous article, the news on Friday is not good regarding the honeybee population. In a report by USA Today about one third of the honeybee population in the United States died in the past year. This decline in the population levels can have far-reaching consequences for our domestic food supply.

The honeybee is responsible for an estimated one out of every three bites of food that the average American consumes each day. The combination of pesticides, environmental changes, and parasites have triggered a dramatic decrease in the population of this crucially important insect.

This survey does report that the winter seasonal losses were the lowest for American bees in a decade. The winter is a characteristically a period where honeybees will die in larger numbers due to the climate conditions. The experts analyzing this report stopped short of saying that the winter loss number was good news because the overall population numbers have declined so precipitously in recent years.

Some crops are almost completely dependent on the honeybee, and those shortages in supply levels are going to result in higher demand. This higher demand with smaller supply levels will result in higher prices that will passed along to the consumer. This includes items such as almonds, raspberries, and other fresh fruits or produce.

The rise in the growth of the organic and farm-to-table movements put a premium on beekeeping and balancing the protection of the bees from parasites against the utilization of harsh chemicals or pesticides. There are certain pesticides and herbicides that are widely used in agriculture that attack the central nervous system of bees causing them to die.

The greater emphasis should be placed on decreasing the chemicals and pesticides used in the production of certain crops. Some states have already initiated areas for honeybee preservation as well, so those areas have many restrictions as far as the use of pesticides and other airborne agents.

The honeybee is vitally important to our food supply and while the winter losses in 2016 were better than recent annual findings, the population is still depleted by one third. It is clear that steps need to be taken to preserve the honeybee colonies in the United States. It is unclear at this point what those steps will be moving forward.