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Bayer gives $1,000 beekeeping grants

Bayer has announced seven blue ribbon beekeepers and 14 new grant recipients as part of their Feed a Bee forage grant program.

Darren Wallis, the vice president of communications for North America at Bayer Crop Science, tells Brownfield they want to get more people involved in bee health.

The blue-ribbon beekeepers are students 18 and younger. They will receive $1,000 towards their education or beekeeping projects.

“Our goal is simply to get people interested and excited and working on this complex issue of bee health,” Wallis says.

Wallis says because the issue of the declining bee population is so complex, many point to modern agriculture as a contributor. He says tools in modern agriculture are more sustainable than ever.

“Farmers are incredible environmentalists themselves,” Wallis says. “And they are stewards of their land and they steward products according to label so that it raises not only the best and healthiest crop they can but that it is incredibly sustainable on their land and the environment around them.”

Wallis says honeybee colony populations have been trending upward over the last decade.