Skip to main content
Advantive

Data in Everyday Life: Are Honey Bees on the Decline?

By Grace Barton Updated
Data in Everyday Life: Are Honey Bees on the Decline?

Honey bees, both wild and domestic, perform about 80 percent of all pollination worldwide. A single bee colony can pollinate up to 300 million flowers each day. While grains are primarily pollinated by the wind; fruits, nuts, and vegetables are pollinated by bees. Seventy out of the top 100 human food crops — which supply about 90 percent of the world’s nutrition — are pollinated by bees.

We’ve heard much over the last several years about the decline of the honey bee. There are a hive of factors being blamed for bees dying off: habitat loss, climate change, disease, parasites, and a new class of pesticides, neonicotinoids that began use in the early 1990s.  But how bad is the problem, really?

For answers, we turn to the National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS) of the United States Department of Agriculture. It has been collecting data on US honey bee colonies for over 30 years. By creating a control chart from the data, we can visualize how the colony numbers have changed over time.

The chart shows a rapid decline in honey bee population beginning in the early 1990s. The decline continues at a slower pace until it bottoms out in 2008. Colony Collapse Disorder was first reported in 2006 and alarms began buzzing shortly after that.  In 2009 the situation starts to look sweeter, as the bee population begins to slowly increase, a possible result of concentrated efforts to save the bees.

On May 20 we celebrate World Bee Day, to acknowledge the role of bees in the ecosystem. It’s the perfect time to consider what we can do to help the bees.

Plant herbs and flowers, especially those that bloom in off-seasons when other flowers don’t, such as sunflowers and sages. Support local beekeepers who produce honey in your own neighborhood. Limit pesticide use, and if you see a swarm of bees in your garden, don’t spray them! Bee informed, educate yourself and others about bees. By better understanding them, we will better learn to respect and protect them.

Grace Barton

Marketing Specialist

About the Author Latest Posts

Grace Barton is a digital marketing and competitive intelligence professional who crafts strategic narratives by bridging marketing insights with analytical expertise. At Advantive, she creates engaging, data-driven content tailored to the distribution, manufacturing, packaging, and quality industries. Her goal is to deliver impactful messaging that drives engagement and growth based on specific gap closure needs, whether responding to sales organization requirements, pinpointing gaps in content, or meeting immediate market trends.
She thrives on transforming competitive intelligence into actionable insights for the sales organization. Grace manages Advantive’s competitive intelligence platform, Klue, to equip the sales team with the battlecards and market data they need to stay ahead of competitors. Since launch, she’s built 28+ battlecards across four lines of business, ensuring the GTM strategy stays sharp.
Grace has a passion for leveraging market insights with storytelling to guide strategic decision-making, empower sales organizations, and nurture organizational growth.

Areas of Expertise: Digital Marketing, Competitive Intelligence, Strategic Narratives, Marketing Insights, Analytical Expertise

LinkedIn

Editorial standards

Fact-checking & editorial guidelines

Every article on advantive.com is written and reviewed against an internal accuracy standard before publication. Here's what that means in practice.

  • Product claims are verified by the brand team that owns the platform.

    When an article references InfinityQS, WinSPC, PQ Systems, Pinpoint, ParityFactory, ProPlanner, KiwiPlan, DDI System, VeraCore, or any of Advantive's other specialty platforms, the relevant product team checks technical statements about features, deployment, and current capability before the article goes live.

  • External statistics cite their source inline.

    When an article references industry survey results, regulatory benchmarks, or third-party research, the source is linked at the point of citation. Statements without an inline source link are first-party observations drawn from Advantive's product teams or customer base.

  • Publication and revision dates stay visible.

    The original publication date and the most recent revision date are both shown on every article. Topics that change quickly — AI capabilities, regulatory rules, product roadmaps — are revisited on a tighter cadence than evergreen reference content.

  • Corrections are issued openly.

    If a factual error is reported, the article is updated, the revision date advances, and material corrections are noted at the bottom of the article so readers can see what changed and when.

Found something wrong, or have a citation to add? Get in touch with the editorial team and we'll review it.

Subject-matter review

Reviewed by subject-matter experts

Advantive is a portfolio of 14+ specialty software platforms — each one built and maintained by a product team that has spent years inside a specific manufacturing or distribution discipline. Articles in technical channels are reviewed by the relevant team before publication.

  • Quality & SPC content

    Reviewed by the InfinityQS, WinSPC, and PQ Systems product teams — the platforms behind statistical process control, capability analysis, and gage management deployments across food, automotive, pharma, and CPG manufacturers.

  • Manufacturing operations & MES content

    Reviewed by the PINpoint, ProPlanner, ParityFactory, and VIA Information Tools teams, whose platforms run production scheduling, traceability, and shop-floor execution for discrete, automotive, and food-and-beverage manufacturers.

  • Packaging & converter content

    Reviewed by the KiwiPlan, Abaca, and AdvantZware teams, who build software specifically for corrugated, folding-carton, and packaging-converter operations.

  • Distribution, ERP & B2B commerce content

    Reviewed by the DDI System (inFORM ERP), Distribution One, VeraCore, Pepperi, and Commerce Vision teams, whose platforms run wholesale ERP, fulfillment, field sales, and B2B portals for specialty distributors and 3PLs.

Are you a practitioner with domain expertise to contribute? Get in touch — we accept guest contributions from operators in the industries we serve.