“If the bee disappeared off the surface of the globe then man would only have four years of life left”.

Certified genius, but certainly not an entemologist, Albert Einstein’s (1879 – 1955) prediction on man’s dependancy on the bee is being propegated through out today’s environmenal conciousness. Whether he really did say it or not is still up for debate. Personally, I don’t think it matters whether he did or not. And besides, this is not the main point for this blog! The point is, I was inspired to see Hagan Daaz take the reign in the honey bee condition with their new campaign “Help the Honey Bees”. Since 40% of their flavours depend on honey bees to pollinate fruits and nuts like strawberries and almonds (they use 1 million lbs of almonds annually), it is in their best interest (and ours) to raise awareness among ice cream lovers around the world. On top of the Hagan Daaz site which is both playful and informative, here are a few more resources (organicconsumers.org/bees and welikeitraw.com) to help us put together the pieces. Bottom line - our precious and prolific pollinators are sick.

What can WE do? The most important thing is to support our local farmers and entemologists - buy organic produce, honey and and beautiful bees wax products from them! Even more interesting, there is quite a lot of information and tips on how to cultivate your garden to be more 'attractive' to bees. Here is a pracical guide for creating bee friendly urban gardens from Berkley.

Side note: According to ecolabelling.org, there are currently 106 food related eco-labels worldwide. Here is another one to look for!