This week, Bidfood, one of the leading
foodservice providers launched its pollination campaign, ‘Follow the Bidfood Bee’ in line with National Pollinator’s Week, to help raise awareness amongst schools across the country about the declining bee colonies in the UK and what we can do to protect them. The falling bee population is an important issue for all local ecosystems and for the food industry as a whole, which is why Bidfood launched this recent campaign. In fact, 70 of the top 100 food crops are pollinated by bees, which supplies about 90% of the world’s nutrition. In a bid to protect our British bees, Bidfood’s depots in Penrith, Hoddesdon, Birmingham and Nottingham partnered with a local bee keeper, to educate school children in their local areas on the vital part bees play in developing our local environment, through educational and interactive workshops. As part of this national project, Bidfood’s depots plan to help support local bee keepers across the country by regularly donating sugar to keep their bees thriving, create bee-friendly gardens at the depots, as well as sponsoring or hosting local bee hives. Speaking about the campaign, Elise Rawlins, Sustainable Development Advisor at Bidfood, said: “One in three bites of food is only possible thanks to bees pollinating our crops. “It’s easy to take something so small for granted, but the importance of bees to the local community, the food industry in general, and our survival, is huge. This is why it was important for us to take part in this campaign to support our local ecosystem and educating the future generations who will be looking after our environment.” As part of the campaign, the ‘Bidfood Bee’ travelled across the country to Bidfood’s depots, to take part in these local workshops and to host sustainable bee costume competitions with the children, where the wining child was awarded with their very own a cuddly Bidfood Bee toy.
