Objectives
Romania's agriculture is experiencing an accelerated intensification process, an important phenomenon in terms of the efficiency of economic operators in the agricultural field but with negative, sometimes disastrous effects for beekeeping and environment. Nowadays, a major cause of the decline of pollinators is the scarcity of food sources for bees due to less use of nectariferous plant hybrids and varieties with a short blooming period. Current agricultural practices leave the land uncultivated after harvesting the main crops until the next sowing. Turning this resource into account is an opportunity that, properly administered, would lead to the progress of both beekeeping and agriculture.
Activities
1. Operational group management
2. Comparative study of plant species to be studied
3. Defining and evaluating the technology to be applied for each considered species
4. Acquisition of equipment for partners and for the management of the operational group
5. Development of online database and smartphone app for managing project results
6. Starting cultures of selected plants and maintenance
7. Placing of beehives in the filed in the vicinity of test cultures
8. Collection of probes from beehives and from the field for evaluation
9. Testing of probes at laboratory level and final report preparation
10. Dissemination
Project details
- Main funding source
- Rural development 2014-2020 for Operational Groups
- Rural Development Programme
- 2014RO06RDNP001 Programul Național de Dezvoltare Rurală pentru perioada 2014 - 2020
Emplacement
- Main geographical location
- Călăraşi
- Other geographical location
- Bucureşti
EUR 270 250.00
Total budget
Total contributions from EAFRD, national co-financing, additional national financing and other financing.
Project keyword
Ressources
1 Practice Abstracts
The project aims to identify, study and implement alternative sources of nutrition (nectar and pollen) for bees and other pollinators by introducing new types of cultures that are appropriate for sustainable agro-environmental conditions, considering the limitation of food supplies as a consequence of the increase in the use of monocultures and less use of nectariferous plant hybrids and varieties with a short blooming period. We aim to identify plants with high nectariferous potential and agricultural practices that will benefit both farmers and beekeepers. For insects one could ensure a continuous flux of nectar and pollen throughout the beekeeping season, thus ensuring a good health for bees, the presence of strong colonies that will have sufficient reserves for winter. Direct effects would be the reduction in costs with artificial food for beekeepers and the decrease in bee mortality over winter. These effects would have a significant effect for apiculture activity, resulting in an estimated 10-30% increase in efficiency. This estimation is facilitated by the potential offered by the available Romanian agricultural soil, considering that only 5% of this (meaning 500000 ha) could be used to implement the EU agro-environmental conditions and provide appropriate food sources for bees. With a potential of 150-200 kg of honey/ha, one could obtain at national level an impressive supplemental beekeeping production of 100000 tons (reference: the Romanian honey production totals roughly 25000 tons). A large scale implementation of the results will ensure the fulfilment of the agro-environmental requirements for farmers and increasing agricultural efficiency by increasing soil quality.
Contacts
Project coordinator
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"ROMAPIS - FEDERATIA ASOCIATIILOR APICOLE DIN ROMANIA"
Project coordinator
Project partners
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APIGARDEN SRL
Project partner
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Alianța Industriei Semințelor din România
Project partner
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Duică I. Ionel PFA,
Project partner
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Pință Gheorghe-Vasile PFA
Project partner
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Tănăsoiu Ionuț-Cristian PFA
Project partner
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UNIVERSITATEA DE STIINTE AGRONOMICE SI MEDICINA VETERINARA BUCURESTI (fuziune intre Universitatea de Științe Agronomice și Medicină Veterinară Bucure
Project partner