Bees Have Been Declared The Most Important Living Thing On Earth

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Despite what Piers Morgan would have you believe, he’s actually not the most important living thing on Earth.

Sorry Piers, it looks like you and your outdated beliefs – no matter how many times you bang on about them on Twitter – are actually nowhere near as important as you think they are. Who’d have thought it?

Instead, bees have been declared the most important living being on the planet, as concluded by the Earthwatch Institute at the last meeting of the Royal Geographical Society of London.

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As per The Science Times, 70% of the world’s agriculture depends exclusively on bees, while pollination – perhaps the most important function of bees – enables the plants to reproduce. Without them, the fauna would soon begin to disappear.

Not only that, but a study conducted by the Apiculture Entrepreneurship Center of the Universidad Mayor (CeapiMayor) and the Apiculture Corporation of Chile (Cach), with the support of the Foundation for Agrarian Innovation (FIA), concluded bees are the only living being that does not carry any type of pathogen – regardless of whether it is a fungus, a virus or a bacterium.

Despite this, bees have now been declared an endangered species, with recent studies showing a dramatic decline in the insects’ numbers; almost 90% of the bee population has disappeared in the past few years.

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The main reasons for their decline can attributed to uncontrolled use of pesticides, a lack of flowers, and deforestation. Because of this, activists believe we need to immediately prohibit the use of pesticides, promote completely natural agricultural alternatives and carefully monitor the health and welfare of bees.

Greenpeace agrees, saying we can restore and protect the world’s bees using ‘common sense actions’ such as banning the seven most dangerous pesticides (including three nicotine culprits), protecting pollinator health by preserving wild habitat, and restoring ecological agriculture.

Basically, ecological farming is needed to preserve wild habitats and protect the bees. This works by avoiding large mono-crops and preserving ecosystem diversity, therefore resisting damage to insects.

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It also restores soil nutrients with natural composting systems, avoids soil loss from wind and water erosion, and avoids pesticides and chemical fertilisers.

In turn, bee populations will be restored and so pollination will be improved, which will then improve crop yields.

You can help save the bees here.

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Lucy Connolly

A Broadcast Journalism Masters graduate who went on to achieve an NCTJ level 3 Diploma in Journalism, Lucy has done stints at ITV, BBC Inside Out and Key 103. While working as a journalist for UNILAD, Lucy has reported on breaking news stories while also writing features about mental health, cervical screening awareness, and Little Mix (who she is unapologetically obsessed with).