THE BEE INFORMED PARTNERSHIP.
Source: Mellifera . May 2011, Vol. 11 Issue 21/22, p41-42. 2p.

The Bee Informed Partnership is an extension Project that endeavours to decrease the number of managed honeybee colonies that die over the winter. Since the winter of 2006 -- 2007, over wintering colonies in the US have died in large numbers. Affected beekeepers span the entire spectrum of the industry: migratory beekeepers to stationary beekeepers; and commercial beekeepers, part-time beekeepers, to back yard beekeepers. 

Migratory and stationary beekeepers alike have, on average, lost 30% or more of their over wintering colonies over the last several years. These losses are unsustainable. If they continue, they threaten not only the livelihoods of beekeepers who manage bees, but the livelihood of farmers who require bees to pollinate their crops. This project will adapt the tools developed by human epidemiologists to study complex human diseases (such as cancer or heart disease) to study honey bee colony health. 

However, this Project will be slightly different than traditional "community health" initiatives in a couple of important ways: 1. Its focus will be to identify management practices that keep colonies alive (rather than just looking for factors that increase the risk of mortality) 2. Findings will be shared rapidly, transparently, and in ways that will enable beekeepers to make informed individualized decisions At its core, the Bee Informed Partnership is motivated by the conviction that beekeepers, when presented with beekeeper-derived data that objectively shows which management practices worked and which did not, will adopt the more successful practices.

[Five years later. Does anyone on Bee-L have experience putting Bee Informed data into successful practice?]

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