Jeroen van der Sluijs (@jeroenvandersluijs.bsky.social)

135 Scientists Warn Europe's Pollinator Crisis Runs Deeper Than Bees A coalition of eight major European Union-funded pollinator projects recently sounded the alarm about pollinator decline across the continent. They believe that if Europe fails to stop the disturbing trend of pollinator loss, the region will face a crisis affecting not just food security but all vital societal functions. Their findings, along with a roadmap titled “Towards Pollinator Stewardship in All Policies,” were just published in Butterfly-EU, part of the EU Open Research Repository. Who Was Involved? The groups that participated in the white paper include Butterfly, VALOR, PollinERA, WildPosh, AGRI4POL, ProPollSoil, RestPoll, and Safeguard. The groups all received funding from Horizon Europe, the European Union’s (EU) flagship research and innovation program. The group was made up of 135 leading researchers with expertise in a variety of disciplines, including ecosystem ecology, pollinator ecology, ecological economics, social science, environmental history, environmental law, behavioral psychology, and political science. The White Paper’s Findings The group noted that Europe risks a real crisis affecting not just food but the overall economy if it doesn’t act immediately to reverse the trend of wild pollinator losses while also protecting and supporting managed bees and other pollinator populations. The group called out the EU’s siloed approach to... https://www.aol.com/articles/135-scientists-warn-europe-pollinator-120200000.html