Valuing over-winter colony losses for New Zealand’s commercial beekeepers

ABSTRACT

The number of managed honeybee colonies in New Zealand has increased dramatically, due largely to increasing high-value mānuka honey exports. Pollination also represents an important part of the apicultural sector, providing critical services to the horticultural and arable crop industries. A survey of winter colony losses has been conducted annually since 2015. Using data from the 2021 wave of the survey, we derive a model to estimate the financial cost of winter colony loss to New Zealand commercial beekeepers in that year. We estimate that winter colony losses conservatively cost commercial beekeepers $24,181,835 in 2021, which amounts to $38.04 per managed colony. This equates to 9.2% of the value of honey yields for commercial beekeepers who produce honey and between 10.6% and 60.5% of the value of contracts for beekeepers who provide pollination services. These substantial costs pose a risk to the profitability of beekeeping.

KEYWORDS:

• Apiculture
• varroa
• honey
• pollination

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Acknowledgements

We gratefully acknowledge the following people for their thoughtful input to this paper: Data and interpretation: Annette Carey, Ministry for Primary Industries. Pollination and area sown in arable crops: Keith Gundry, Pure Oil New Zealand Ltd; Ivan Lawrie, Foundation for Arable Research; Matt McCully, Midlands Apiaries. Honey volumes: Phil Edmonds, Apiculture New Zealand; Sean Goodwin, Pure New Zealand Honey. Honey prices: Six honey buyers who provided honey purchase prices on condition of anonymity. We also acknowledge Pam Booth, Manaaki Whenua – Landcare Research, for reviewing this paper and offering insightful feedback.

Notes

1 As of June 2021, 5.7% of New Zealand beekeepers managed 85% of honey bee colonies according to annual disease returns filed with the New Zealand National American Foulbrood Pest Management Plan Management Agency. In contrast, 20% of beekeepers in Canada manage 80% of colonies (Canadian Honey Council 2022).

2 Biosecurity (National American Foulbrood Pest Management Plan) Order 1998.

3 For example, the average response rate in EU countries is around 5% (Gray et al., 2022). The share of colonies covered in the U.S. survey is estimated to be below 10% (Bee Informed Partnership, 2021).

4 To wit, MPI (2021) reported a price range for bulk mānuka honey of $8-$120 per kilogram for the 2020/21 season.

5 The price obtained for monofloral mānuka honey depends critically on the methylglyoxal (MGO) content or the Unique Mānuka Factor or UMF (a measure of unique signature compounds including leptosperin, DHA, and MGO).

6 The remaining colonies were used for activities that are not strongly affected by colony losses, e.g. queen rearing and the production of products such as beeswax.

7 $nF$ may also reflect the cost of cleaning brood frames that are not replaced.

8 See: https://www.mpi.govt.nz/food-business/honey-bee-products-processing-requirements/manuka-honey-testing/

9 As expected, these figures are all below the export prices for bulk export honey ($31 for monofloral mānuka, $17 for multifloral mānuka, and $12 for non-mānuka) reported by Statistics NZ Export Trade Data.

10 Beekeepers facing different costs can use Equations (1)–(3) to more accurately estimate the impact of over-winter losses on their own operations.

11 And indeed worldwide, having recently been found in Australia, the last large land mass without a significant varroa incursion. https://www.outbreak.gov.au/current-responses-to-outbreaks/varroa-mite