We often talk about the climate crisis, pesticides, intensive agriculture, habitat loss. We use the word “biodiversity” almost every day, as if it were a familiar concept, yet there is an elementary question that still surprisingly remains open: how many species of bees really exist in the world?
It’s not an entomologist’s curiosity. It is an issue that concerns our food, the stability of ecosystems and, ultimately, the quality of life for all of us. For the first time, a study published in Nature Communications tries to give an answer with solid statistical bases. The number that emerges is higher than we thought: there could be between 24,705 and 26,164 species of bees on the planet. And, perhaps, we will never be able to know them all.
Bees and biodiversity: why their number matters more than we imagine
When we think of bees, our imagination immediately goes to the honey bee or the bumblebees we see in spring meadows. In reality we are talking about a vast and still partly unexplored universe.
Bees represent the most important group of animal pollinators in the world. Without their silent work, a significant part of our food system would collapse. Globally, the economic value of pollination of agricultural crops – adjusted for inflation – is estimated at around A$745 billion per year. But reducing everything to an economic figure would be limiting.
Approximately 75% of food crop diversity and 35% of total food production benefit from animal pollination. Over 90% of flowering plants, approximately 307,000 species, depend on animals to reproduce. Plants produce oxygen, absorb carbon dioxide, regulate temperature, protect soil from erosion and form the basis of food chains.
Bees are a “keystone” group in ecosystems: their disappearance would cause chain effects that are difficult to contain. Understanding how many species exist means better understanding the resilience and fragility of the natural systems that support us.
From historical estimates to new statistical analyses
In 2007, the American entomologist Charles Michener, in his book Bees of the World, estimated over 18,000 known species and more than 20,000 in total. Today we have exceeded 21,000 formally described species, but these were still assessments not supported by a global statistical model.
The novelty of the study published in Nature Communications lies precisely in the approach. The researchers used more than 8.3 million records of bee presence around the world, along with national checklists and a global taxonomic database of around 21,000 already named species. Through statistical models they estimated the “lower limit” of the real number of existing species.
The principle is intuitive if we bring it back to a local scale. If we always find the same abundant species in an area, it is likely that the sampling is almost complete. If, however, many rare species emerge, observed only a few times, it means that real biodiversity could be wider than what has been detected so far. Applying this reasoning at a global level results in a more robust and conservative estimate.
Up to 26,164 bee species in the world
The result speaks of an increase of between 18% and 25% compared to previous estimates. In absolute numbers this means we could have as many as 26,164 bee species on the planet.
At the current rate of description, about 117 new species per year, it would take between 32 and 45 years to catalog them all. And this prediction is conservative, because the species that are easiest to identify have already been described, while the remaining ones could be more elusive, concentrated in remote areas or distinguishable only through advanced genetic techniques.
The new discoveries will likely be concentrated in Asia and Africa, where research is more complex and available data is still limited. In several African countries there is even a lack of usable detection points. Even in economically developed nations like Australia, the systematic absence of genetic analyzes can lead to underestimating the real richness of species, especially in the case of so-called “cryptic” species, which are morphologically very similar to each other.
A method that changes the way we count life on Earth
The scope of this research goes beyond the world of bees. The developed model demonstrates that it is possible to estimate the total number of species of a biological group using already existing data and advanced statistical tools. This means being able to better direct conservation policies, establish research priorities and protect areas where biodiversity is still little known in a more targeted way.
A cost-benefit analysis conducted in Australia estimated that every dollar invested in the discovery and documentation of as yet unknown species could generate up to $35 in economic benefits for the country. Investing in knowledge of biodiversity is not only an ethical or environmental choice, but also a far-sighted strategy from an economic and social point of view.
The real reflection, perhaps, concerns time: between the climate crisis and accelerated habitat loss, we could lose species before we even know they exist. Each new species identified is a piece of a complex mosaic that tells the story of life on the planet.
Knowing that there could be up to 26,000 species of bees gives us a richer and at the same time more fragile image of nature. And it is precisely from this awareness that a more concrete commitment can arise to protect pollinators, reduce the use of pesticides, protect natural habitats and rethink our agricultural model.
Because knowing is the first step to safeguarding.
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