Rental pollinators, the business of the future

Rental pollinators, the business of the future

Deforestation, agricultural expansion, or intensive use of pesticides, among other factors, are leading to a are leading to a. In its April column, Jean Remy Guimaraes said the theme and the growth in demand for rented pollinators.

By: Jean Remy Davée Guimarães

Published 19/04/2013 |

If you received your retirement fund or any good hefty and are wondering what to do with that money, forget the inn, o bar, the Temakeria or franchise yogo-something. There is a sector of the economy that is experiencing phenomenal growth and has emerged due to the global environmental crisis: the pollinators rentals for farmers, to compensate for the loss of the usual pollinators, Wild and free, which are also disappearing on a global scale.

A Google search with the terms "pollinator rental"Returns about 220.000 results in 0,12 seconds. With "pollinators rental", 83.000 results and the first page already shows that, in Brazil, business is booming, at least in cucumber production, papaya, melon and passion fruit.

Hard life this. There has to be credit, rain at the right time, road to ensure the production and now this news, pay for pollination?

The causes are many, some covered in previous columns: the loss of habitats and biodiversity due to deforestation and agricultural and urban expansion, the intensive use of pesticides and the creation of green deserts via monoculture.

The result is that producers of almonds, cucumbers, apples, pears, strawberries, raspberries, blueberries, cherries, pumpkins, melons, watermelons, courgettes - and any other item of the human diet that is a vegetable with flowers - now has to bear a cost that was never part of the spreadsheet no farmer, since agriculture as we know it was invented, about 10.000 years.

Now, whenever the time of flowering approaches, these producers are wondering if the bees and other pollinating insects will come and will do so on time and in sufficient quantity to ensure the crop. Hard life this. There has to be credit, rain at the right time, road to ensure the production and now this news, pay for pollination?

For get ready to discover a new world, with pollination companies that rent crowded truck pallets with bee colonies. These trucks are making the circuit of the properties that hire them, one week there, another there, a frantic, seasonal and profitable activity.

There are already bee brokers. Lease prices rise more than the gold. Academic and agricultural technicians comparing changes in prices on the east coast and west. There are not enough bees to meet demand, the agriculture and beekeeping bulletins echo the concerns of both sectors.

Agricultural authorities have published guidance documents for potential landlords to prevent buy pig in a poke, and there are pressures for regulation of the sector. Check it out, all this for something that until a few decades ago it was not an issue, let alone a cost, as pollination was carried out efficiently and free of insects, birds, bats and any other creature endowed with movement you enjoy nectar.

Insanity and externalities

The disappearance of pollinators and the new costs and risks that this entails to agriculture are perhaps the best example of collective insanity in which we stuck. A agricultura industrial, based on saturated monoculture pesticides and other inputs, It was supposed to be the crop of salvation, thanks to its productivity and predictability.

The disappearance of pollinators and the new costs and risks that this entails are perhaps the best example of collective insanity in which we stuck

He gave relatively certain for a long time, while the agricultural areas of low biodiversity were lined with natural areas - or not so -, they were wild reservoirs pollinators. With the apparent success of the model, these reservoirs were waning and now the bees lessors are treated the sponge cake by farmers who pay in advance, beg to sign five-year contracts and send Christmas cards and birthday, Tickets for the final baseball and other treats.

The case of the disappearance of pollinators is also an excellent example of what economists call externalities, and how it hurts in the pocket when it ceases to be so. To understand the importance of an environmental service, nothing better than going to pay for it.

Environmental services such as pollination, regulating the water cycle, temperature and others were never recorded in the spreadsheet of economic activities that exploit environmental resources. These were considered infinite and free. The costs of air and water pollution and biodiversity loss were not embedded in the final cost of the resulting products and not taxed. In short, the cost of the use or degradation of natural resources was not calculated or considered: It was an externality.

The cost of the use or degradation of natural resources was not calculated or considered: era an externality

But as such the infinite resources were dwindling and that the price of a drinking water tanker car started to become salty, calculate the cost of externalities has become a priority. To return to the example of pollinators, researchers at the University of California Berkeley estimate that wild pollinators still survivors in California represent an annual savings of up to 2,4 billions of dollars to the state's farmers.

Juggling and appeals

The valuation of environmental resources and services is an essential tool of management and decision-making to come up with something like sustainable development, or more pragmatically, less unsustainable. It is no easy task. It requires the understanding between disparate areas of professionals who were not trained for this and are learning to blows and, sometimes, à do.

Engineers have known for centuries calculate structures, but list the impacts and costs of an entire production cycle is a lot of sand to the small truck from one discipline only and requires great humility and resistance to frustration. After all, They do not stop to appear causal relationships that had not even been imagined hitherto, and requiring new methodological juggling to its valuation. Deal with it should be as harrowing as trying to build something on land that not for quiet.

How much for humanity - for hours not worked, waste of resources, carbon emissions and health care costs - one hour transit 5 km/hora, in town 20 millons of citizens? How much does a bus that does not stop at point, excess noise, sodium, fat and sugar, hopelessness or place in school? Are seemingly disparate questions that increasingly have very concrete answers, and in the currency of your choice.

But do not get carried away, It is a new area, which is still in its infancy, and than, in doing so, reveals every step over our ignorance than our ability. Any valuation of environmental and health costs is more likely to be under than overrated and most of them come under review, and always up.

This exercise also generates moments of rare happiness, when we see ecologists and land managers in unison using the language of economics section to convince farmers and ranchers of the importance of preserving and properly manage the natural grasslands, habitat for many plants and flowers, therefore, supporting wild pollinators.

They say something like: "It's like an investment portfolio, it is important to diversify. Like this, if some stocks fall, others go up and we will maintain the capital. We can not rely solely on rent bees and the maintenance of biodiversity is a guarantee of current and future agricultural production. "And then, to, to! Beware that we know how much it will cost to their pockets if they continue pretending it's not with you.

So, will invest in what? Bees, wasps, drones, bats, butterflies and swallows?

Jean Remy Davée Guimarães


Institute of Biophysics Carlos Chagas FilhoUniversidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro

Published 19/04/2013:

http://cienciahoje.uol.com.br/colunas/terra-em-transe/aluguel-de-polinizadores-o-negocio-do-futuro