Current Issue

Immense numbers of organisms are involved in the complex ecological interactions that made possible to keep food on our table. Pollinators share the most among them. Pollination is a process of transferring male gamete to female reproductive organ and is inevitable for plant reproduction, thus crop yield. While some plants are self-pollinated or wind pollinated, most flowering plants need help from pollinators to produce fruits and seeds. Seventy five percent of the 115 major crops grown globally are pollinator dependent and up to 35% of global annual agricultural production by weight is pollinator dependent (Klein et al., 2007). Not only the productivity or yield but also it improves the quality of the fruit leading to higher-value crops from the same yield (Klatt et al., 2013).

Pollination depends on the symbiotic relationship between pollinator and pollinated plants. Among insect pollinators honey bee has received the most attention and considered the major pollinator workhorse. However, a substantial volume of recent studies indicates that the native pollinators i.e. bumblebees, solitary wild bees provide essential reproductive service for wild as well as cultivated plants in virtually all terrestrial ecosystem. It was 1985 when first time De Jonge uncovered the economic benefits of using bumblebee for pollination of greenhouse tomatoes and subsequently funded the commercial bee rearing organizations (Velthuis and van Doorn, 2006). Today beside the largely managed honey bee, bumblebees are also significant stakeholders of the commercial pollinator market.

Although there is a scope of argument on the subject of ‘global pollination crises’, studies provide evidences of pollinator population diminishing in some parts of the world like North America, few European regions (Potts et al., 2010; UNEP, 2010). Habitat deterioration including habitat degradation and fragmentation of natural habitat, higher pathogen prevalence, competition between native and invasive species, agricultural intensification leading to less plant diversity and climate change are the probable causes of pollinators’ declination. The declination of pollinator population is likely to cause of lower yield of pollination dependent crops (Fig. 2). A recent study showed that global honey bee colony numbers were positively correlated with the little, modest and great pollinator dependent crops but negatively correlated with essential pollinator dependent crops (Ghosh and Jung, 2016). In turn, the disastrous declination of pollinator population could cause a dramatic increase in non-communicable and under-nutrition, primarily micronutrient deficient related disease burden (Smith et al., 2015; Ghosh and Jung, 2018). To cite a few examples, in Korea 37.3% of total vitamin A (RAE) and 27.5% of total folate are produced by pollinator dependent crops (Ghosh and Jung, 2018). Thus, it can be easily understood that pollination service is essential for the survival of human.

Fig. 2. 
Schematic diagram representing the relation between pollination and nutrition.

Honey: Started about 3000 years ago, beekeeping is known to almost all parts of the world today. The product of beehive which comes first in the mind is honey. Honey bee collects nectar and produces honey by a process which involves enzymes like invertase, glucose oxidase and catalase. Mentioned in the age old classical literatures and as well as modern scientific documentations, honey’s therapeutic and nutritional value on account of its functional properties including antimicrobial, antioxidant efficacy is unquestionable (Khan et al., 2007; Mandal and Mandal, 2011; Cortés et al., 2011; Ajibola et al., 2012). An increasing trend is noticed for the total worldwide production of honey (Fig. 3A). The production of world honey bee rose to more than 1.8 million tons in 2018 from 0.7 million tons in 1961 (http://www.fao.org/faostat) (Fig. 3A). Many countries have established legal framework in order to ensure the quality or standard of honey. Moreover, international regulation or standard on the quality of honey has also been imposed. To elaborate, the permissible limit for moisture content of honey has been permitted up to 20% according to Codex standard. Codex standard also recommends electrical conductivity (EC) value to be within 0.8 mS/cM. In order to compliance the same standard, honey should contain fructose and glucose together 60 g. Also there is a recommendation for Hydroxy methyl furfural (HMF) content and other specifications of honey. In this context, it is worth mentioning that mostly standardization considers honey from Apis mellifera. The standardization of honey from honey bees other than A. mellifera still remains as an unfinished task.

Fig. 3. 
A. Worldwide production of honey and trend of production during 1961 to 2018. B. Worldwide bee wax production and trend of production during 1961 to 2018 (Data obtained from http://www.fao.org/faostat).

Bee wax: Bee wax is the foundation of the bee colony and has vast arrays of use. Human have exploited the use of wax to their benefits. They are used in cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, art (metal castings and modeling, paintings), candle making, varnishes and polishes (Krell, 1996). Bee wax has been used in colors of the wall paintings (Birshtein et al., 1975) and also used in wrappings for the covering mummies in Egypt (Benson et al., 1978). The major proportion of the bee wax was consumed by the local beekeeper to make comb foundation. As the demand of wax increases over the years its production as well as value is also increasing over the years (Fig. 3B).

Bee Pollen: Bee pollen is another hive product which can be obtained very easily with the installation of pollen trap. Bee pollen is the primary source of nutrition including protein, fatty acids, sterols, minerals and vitamins for honey bees. Detailed examination of nutrient content and digestibility demonstrates bee pollen can be relevant to human nutrition especially as a nutrition supplement (Franchi et al., 1997; Human and Nicolson, 2006; Szczêsna, 2006; Morgano et al., 2012; Ghosh and Jung, 2017; Ghosh et al., 2020a). As with the increasing awareness about organic food supplements, bee pollen is increasingly becoming popular. Similarly like honey, different countries already framed legal standardization for bee pollen intended for human use (Ghosh and Jung, 2017). Bee pollen is also known to have high antioxidant properties which encourage the research concerning the application of bee pollen as an agent preventing or alleviating harmful oxidative processes occurring in organisms or caused by different factors (Kocot et al., 2018). Besides, bee pollen marketing could help enhancing the earning of small and medium scale bee keepers.

Royal Jelly: Young nurse bees produce royal jelly, a precious food for queen honey bee. Royal jelly is secreted from hypopharyngeal gland. Chemically, fresh royal jelly contains water (60 to 70%), protein (9 to 18%), carbohydrate (7 to 18%), lipid (3 to 8%), ash (0.8 to 3%) minerals and vitamins (thiamin, riboflavin, pantothenic acid, pyridoxine, niacin, folic acid, inositol, and biotin) (Sabatini et al., 2009). A significant amount of 10-hydroxy-2-decenoic acid (10-HDA) is presents in royal jelly, exhibits immunomodulatory, antimicrobial and antitumor properties (Izuta et al., 2009; Sugiyama et al., 2012). Moreover, royal jelly also exhibits activities like of bio-stimulating and anti-fatigue (Kamakura et al., 2001), life prolonging and anti-stress and tranquilizing effect, anti-arteriosclerotic and heart-protecting, antibacterial, antiviral and anti-fungal effect, radiation protective, immune-modulating and anti-carcinogenic effect on different animal models (Manzo et al., 2015). Kashima et al. (2014) identified hypocholesterolemic protein, Major Royal Jelly Protein 1 (MRJP1) which increases the enzyme CYP7A1 responsible for the degradation of cholesterol in mice and also have broad pharmacological activities in humans (Tian et al., 2018). Recently royal jelly is becoming a better source of income as it is used in cosmetics and functional food industry.

Propolis: Exudates of plants as resin collected by honey bee are used in honey bee colony to seal the hive and for their antibacterial properties (Marcucci et al., 2001). These food products from the honey bee have profound significance not only for their nutritional value but also for their medicinal value. It has bacteriostatic (Bonvehí et al., 1994) effect with lots of phenolic compounds (Martos et al., 1997; Socha et al., 2014) having therapeutic application (Sforcin, 2016). They may act as an antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, antibacterial, antiviral, and anti-ulcerous activities (Viuda-Martos et al., 2008; Simone-Finstrom and Spivak, 2010). These kind of activities are mainly due to the phenolic compounds, flavonoids which are present in honey, propolis and even in royal jelly (Cushnie and Lamb, 2005; Fiorani et al., 2006).

Bee venom: Bee venom exhibits a wide range of therapeutic properties like neuroprotective, rheumatoid arthritis, tendonitis and muscle conditions such as fibromyositis and enthesitis and other complications (Doo et al., 2010; Hong et al., 2010; Ali, 2012; Cherniack and Govorushko, 2018; https://www.webmd.com/vitamins/ai/ingredientmono-972/bee-venom, accessed 6^th June 2020). Bee venom mainly contains melittin, apamine, phospholipase A2 etc. (Ali, 2012). However, to collect bee venom high throughput technology is required and often this is beyond the affordability and/or accessibility of small to medium scale bee keepers.

Honey bee brood as food: In the context of hive products or api-products, which is less well appreciated is the honey bees themselves. In our previous series of works we examined nutritional value of honey bee brood of different bee species as well as castes. Honey bee brood and adult would be an excellent source of nutrition with their higher or comparable protein enriched with amino acids, minerals but less fat content than that of conventional food sources (Hockings and Matsumara, 1960; Finke, 2005; Ghosh et al., 2016, 2020b, 2020c). However, we advocated processing of the brood in order to remove anti-nutrient contents of it (Ghosh et al., 2020c). In the light of rapid human population growth and unanticipated climate change insect eating is gaining attention as a sustainable way to feed the human population of the planet. In this context, it is remarkable that honey bee is the third most domesticated animal on the earth and has a long history compared to other candidates of insect farming. Moreover, brood farming has several advantages including the requirement of relatively small arable space, lower investment to set up hives etc. Bee brood is already eaten as a delicacy in many countries including Africa, Mexico, Thailand, Australia, Nepal etc. (Burgett, 1990; Wongsiri et al., 1997; Jensen et al., 2016).