In a message dated 19/01/2010 15:43:39 GMT Standard Time,  
[log in to unmask] writes:

Why do  we want to open up yet more opportunities for yet other bee 
disasters,  invariably associated with global trafficking of bees?

Why do we have  to become the world’s largest parking lot for all sorts of 
pathogens?  No  one has ever suffered death from not eating an almond or an  
orange. 


Perhaps it would be ecologically and economically sounder for US growers of 
 citrus and of almonds to buy/lease land around the Mediterranean and 
(some!)  parts of the Middle East where the plants are native, the bees are 
native and  labour is cheap and shift production there. This would save the US 
from the  predicted ecological disasters while still controlling production of 
a large  proportion of these popular foodstuffs.
 
Chris

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