Diversity pays in crop pollination

Pollination is an often overlooked but large cost factor in crop production. In spite of the high diversity of flowers, which requires an adequate diversity of pollinators, almost all animal pollination is simplistically ascribed to the manageable but often less efficient pollinator, the European honeybee, Apis mellifera L. In the case of poor pollination by honeybees, a number of costly techniques is applied to enforce fruit set-often with poor results. Finally, growers may resort to hand pollination, which greatly raises production costs. Knowledge of the appropriate pollinator is already available in many cases, however. This Is demonstrated in this paper with examples spanning the whole range of pollination syndromes. To make this knowledge accessible, an expert-based Internet-accessible database is suggested.