POLLINATORS POLLINATION AND FOOD PRODUCTION

THE ASSESSMENT REPORT ON POLLINATORS, POLLINATION AND FOOD PRODUCTION
management (i.e., national; Satake et al., 2008). Finally, the
chosen scale for valuation is different from the characteristic
scale of the processes that affect pollination effectiveness
and product prices (a methodological problem; MEA, 2005).
Scale mismatches can affect the accuracy of valuation
estimates and, more crucially, the distribution of benefits
from management actions.
factors that need to be taken into account when considering
the different temporal scales.
3.2.2 Temporal factors affecting
pollination valuation
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4. ECONOMIC VALUATION OF POLLINATOR GAINS
AND LOSSES
Thus, it is crucial to delimit clear scale categories for
pollination valuation. Many approaches were proposed for
ecological processes and ecosystem services in general
(Turner, 1988; MEA, 2005; Vermaat et al., 2005; Hein et al.,
2006; Feld et al., 2009; Díaz et al., 2011; Serna-Chavez
et al., 2014), but no standard categorization of scales has
been proposed for pollination valuation so far. It makes
sense to work with scale categories that represent the
extension (spatial scale) and duration (temporal scale) of
processes for which the necessary data for valuation can be
collected or compiled. Variables such as crop yield and price
are frequently aggregated in government censuses by farm,
county, politically defined sub-state or sub-national regions,
provinces/states and countries, and conducted monthly
or annually. The proposed scale categories for the present
assessment are defined in Table 4.5.
3.2 Pollinator valuation across the
temporal scale
3.2.1 Rationale
The temporal scale has important strategic implications that
can vary between stakeholders. For example, farmers are
often more interested in longer term average yields (over
several years) than short-term (1 year) maximization of yield,
thus considering longer time scales is essential when linking
valuation to decision-making. Another example is related
to the farmer decision-making in crop choice: farmers can
easily switch between different annual species; however, due
to the time lag between planting and productivity, switching
from annual to perennial species or between perennial
crops involves a major long-term commitment. Farmers’
ability to switch between crops depends also on the level
of investments needed by the managing choices (e.g.,
irrigation costs limit the ability to switch to another crop).
Thus, the temporal scale is important to consider because
the meaning of the economic valuation is fundamentally
scale-dependent as well as the political implications of
management decisions. In indigenous beekeeping, while the
majority of beekeepers take a short-term view to exploiting
their seemingly abundant resources, some innovative groups
and networks of local entrepreneurs have secure long-term
products, processes and market sustainability laying the
foundations for sustainable livelihoods and conservation
(Ingram et al., 2011). In the next sub-section, we present the
3.2.2.1 Price dynamics
Many economic valuation studies estimate pollinators’
contribution to crop production (see Section 7). In several
methods used for evaluating pollination benefits, two main
variables are used: the crop price (Section 2.2 and 2.4.) and
the price of beehives (Section 2.1.2 and 2.3.).
The variability of the crop price across time is driven by
variation in both demand and supply of the crop. However,
these two components of the agricultural market are prone
to change at different intervals, some crops will change
every few years while others will change several times a
year, due to many factors (Drummond and Goodwin, 2014).
Factors influencing demands include the price of substitute
goods of pollinated crops, price of complementary
goods, the consumers’ income, the consumer’s tastes
and preferences for different crop (dependent or not
on pollinators), the expectations of a pollinator decline
and the demography of consumer population. Factors
influencing the supply include the price of inputs, the
price at a preceding period, the substitutes and their
characteristics (e.g., their prices), the technology, the taxes
and subsidies, the expectation about future events and
the number of businesses. The complexity arising from the
interaction of all these factors highlights the difficulties of
predicting future crop market prices, affecting longer-term
valuation estimates.
The price of hiring beehives for pollination is similarly
determined through equilibrium between supply of
beehive from beekeepers and the demand from farmers.
Professional beekeeper 2 will also aim to maximize their
benefits. However, this benefit depends on the two main
goods or services that this activity contributes to produce:
pollination service and honey. Thus, Rucker et al. (2012)
and Muth et al. (2003) demonstrated the competition
between pollination service and honey market; when the
price of honey was high, beekeepers preferred to produce
more honey and abandoned the pollination service. The
consequences for the crops market are measurable,
because the decrease of the supply of pollination
service has a negative impact on the yield of crops and,
consequently, the price of crops will increase. Therefore, the
evolution of the beehive price is also highly dependent on
other markets, making predictions similarly difficult.
2. Hobby beekeepers are not considered in detail here because of the
limited available literature on the subject.