The fifth edition of The State Energy Efficiency Index (SEEI), initiated by Bureau of Energy Efficiency (BEE), in association with Alliance for an Energy Efficient Economy (AEEE), to evaluate the annual progress of energy efficiency implementation in the states. The State Energy Efficiency Index (SEEI) identifies and addresses gaps concerning …
The potential for infectious pathogens to spillover and emerge from managed populations to wildlife communities is poorly understood, but ecological, evolutionary and anthropogenic factors are all likely to influence the initial exposure and subsequent infection, spread and impact of disease. Fast-evolving RNA viruses, known to cause severe colony losses in …
A new analysis exposes how the American and European pesticide industry is using ongoing EU-US trade negotiations to lower human health and environmental standards in order to increase trade in toxic pesticides. A new study by the Center for International Environmental Law (CIEL), Lowest Common Denominator: How the EU-US trade …
A warming world could be bad news for honeybees. Scientists have found that the spread of an exotic bee parasite, now found worldwide, is linked to climate and not just superior competitive ability. In order to examine the spread of bee parasites, the scientists compared pathogen growth in honeybees that …
Climate change threatens the survival of the UK's honey bee population, according to research by scientists at Queen's University, Belfast. An exotic parasite that targets the insects is set to flourish in northern Europe if the Earth continues to warm, the study says. It assessed the future threat posed by …
Ontario plans to reduce the use of an insecticide that has been linked to bee deaths, making it the first jurisdiction in North America to do so. Ontario, Canada’s largest producer of corn and soybeans, said today that by 2017 it intends to cut by 80 percent the acreage sown …
California regulators violated the law by approving expanded use of pesticides that have been shown to hurt honeybees needed for pollinating key American crops, according to a lawsuit filed against the state by environmental groups on Tuesday. The lawsuit seeks an injunction prohibiting the state Department of Pesticide Regulation from …
These moths, whose olfactory abilities are as good as a bloodhound's and vastly better than a human's, can fly up to 80 miles (130 km) a night searching for their favorite flowers such as the Sacred Datura. The nectar of these fragrant white, trumpet-shaped flowers that bloom only once at …
Regulations on pesticides have failed to prevent poisoning of almost all habitats, international team of scientists concludes. The world’s most widely used insecticides have contaminated the environment across the planet so pervasively that global food production is at risk, according to a comprehensive scientific assessment of the chemicals’ impacts. This …
One way that family farmers improve their resilience to both climatic and economic shocks is to diversify what is produced. More and different crops and livestock, particularly local varieties and breeds are being promoted. Two other options stand out too – bees and trees. These have the added advantages of …
The best quality honey is produced from Aegialitis rotundifolia and Cynometra ramiflora, according to the mangrove cell. In a bid to encourage locals to conserve mangrove forests, the Mangrove Cell will soon introduce apiculture. The GOI-United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) committee, which met in Mumbai last week, has approved a …
Landmark research shows 29% of honeybee colonies died in winter of 2012-13, with summer losses also high at 9.7% A landmark study has revealed the UK is suffering one of the worst rates of honeybee colony deaths in Europe. In the cold winter of 2012-13, 29% of honeybee colonies in …
Almost a quarter of Europe's bumblebees are at risk of extinction due to loss of habitats and climate change, threatening pollination of crops worth billions of dollars, a study showed on Wednesday. Sixteen of 68 bumblebee species in Europe are at risk, the Red List of the International Union for …
Exposure to pollution from diesel exhaust fumes can disrupt honeybees' ability to recognize the smells of flowers and could in future affect pollination and global food security, researchers said on Thursday. In a study published in the Nature journal Scientific Reports, scientists from Britain's University of Southampton found that the …
Honeybees utilise floral odours when foraging for flowers; we investigated whether diesel exhaust pollution could interrupt these floral odour stimuli. A synthetic blend of eight floral chemicals, identified from oilseed rape, was exposed to diesel exhaust pollution. Within one minute of exposure the abundances of four of the chemicals were …
Three widely-used pesticides made by Switzerland's Syngenta and Germany's Bayer pose an acute risk to honeybees, the European Union's food safety watchdog said on Wednesday, but stopped short of linking them to bee colony collapse. Fears over the effects on bees of neonicotinoid insecticides - among the most commonly used …
Prem Kumar Nirania, 32, is an advocate in Abohar’s local courts. In March, he saw a newspaper advertisement on a training camp at Krishi Vigyan Kendra, Ferozepur, and decided to join. He started beekeeping immediately after the training camp ended. Today Nirania has about 70 bee colonies and has also …
The National Bee Board and Forest Research Institute will work jointly to promote honey culture programmes in forestry sectors, which will be very useful for poverty alleviation and for improvement and social upliftment of the poor villagers, who will participate in beekeeping and honey culture. This decision was taken following …
In the US, the cultivated area (hectares) and production (tonnes) of crops that require or benefit from insect pollination (directly dependent crops: apples, almonds, blueberries, cucurbits, etc.) increased from 1992, the first year in this study, through 1999 and continued near those levels through 2009; aggregate yield (tonnes/hectare) remained unchanged. …
It represents a serious threat to agriculture because bees are pollination agents for the majority of crops. WORLDWIDE declines in bee colonies, threatening much of global agriculture, may be caused by a new generation of nerve-agent pesticides, two new scientific studies strongly suggest. The findings place a massive question mark …
