Ecobreves – PANAMA: Coffee Bees

By IPS Correspondents and - - Reprint | | Print |

PANAMA CITY, Jul 21 2002 (IPS) - The presence of African bees led to a 25-percent increase in the production and weight of two varieties of coffee grown in the western Panamanian province of Chiriquí, according to a study by the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute. The African bees, which arrived in the country in the 1980s, have sporadically attacked and killed humans, and have hurt the bee-keeping industry, particularly in Chiriquí, where a large portion of Panama's honey is produced.

But entomologist David W. Roubik conducted a five-year study that links those bees to the rise in production of caturra and catimor coffees. The area of study encompassed a 30 square km zone along the Costa Rican border.

Roubik's study was published in June by the science journal Nature and included in the book “Panama: Biological Bridge”, edited by Panamanian anthropologist Stanley Heckadon-Moreno.