Podcast

Serious Buzz About the World’s Bees

Beekeepers meet to understand what's behind the global decline of bees — which threatens the world's food supply — and to share best practices for reversing the trend.

Illustration by Daniel Chang.
Illustration by Daniel Chang.

Now, my dad one time said to me —  he, in fact, he said to me several times — will you be a beekeeper or a keeper of bees?” –

Philip McCabe, president, Apimondia

Podcast host Ashley Milne-Tyte talks with Philip McCabe, president of Apimondia, the global body that represents beekeepers, about how the organization’s biannual conference plays a unique role in working to reverse the alarming decline of the world’s bee population.

The global conference, which is conducted in five languages, highlights the latest scientific research about the complex causes for the decline and members share their own localized knowledge about best practices.  “You have a whole range of subjects being talked about,” McCabe says. “The benefit of that at the end is when they come back, they talk to one another, listen to what they found, and they have a discussion – and sometimes they bring it back to their own countries and talk about it there as well.”

And if you’ve ever wondered about what’s behind the decline of bees and the phenomenon of bee-colony collapse, McCabe offers a highly accessible look at its causes and at exactly what is at stake.

Convene wrote in April about the process of choosing the site for the planned  2019 46th International Apicultural Congress, aka Apimondia. 

Listen: 

Ashley Milne-Tyte