Project:Uplift

What is UPLIFT?

Unified Pollinator and Livestock Incentivized Financial Trust

Uplift is a program designed to support beekeeping as an industry. It is based on the ECAP program, but chosen to be a positive incentive as opposed to a program that only kicks in during problem times. Just as ECAP was designed to support all row crop farmers, we propose a program to help all beekeepers.

ECAP (the Emergency Commodity Assistance Program) was recently rolled out to provide assistance to commodity crops. Unfortunately, the program does not help one of the most endangered industries in agriculture, professional apiculture. Commercial beekeepers today are indirectly responsible for ~$34 billion in U.S. food production. Without them, we would see almonds reduced by 80%, blueberries cut by two-thirds, apple tonnage would drop by half, watermelon and cranberries by at least half — the list goes on. We should also mention, the canola and alfalfa industries need us to provide hybrid seed. Bottom line, pollination of today’s agricultural crops is in serious jeopardy. There are about 90 crops that currently use managed pollinators.

The current system, designed to help farmers and keep food costs low, provides little to no help to struggling beekeepers.

While we have access to ELAP (the Emergency Livestock Assistance Program), which has helped, the real problem is ELAP is the wrong incentive, and has turned into a crutch, many times for bad beekeeping. If you add to that it is not designed for beekeepers, the problems abound. As such we propose a solution.

The reasons for our financial problems are pretty simple: Honey is no longer a commodity crop, and its profitability has vanished, with current prices within pennies of cost of production. Cheaper imports have not helped, and sugar is just more readily available in the market.

Labor and transportation costs are through the roof, and bee health is a major stumbling block. As such the profitability of apiculture has dropped significantly. Both labor and transportation have more than doubled in the last 10 years, while honey and pollination prices have stayed flat.

We as an industry are literally at the point of making health decision for our stock based on cash flow — choosing between doing the right thing long-term, and gambling on quick gains.

UPLIFT is a support program to ease gentrification

As a result, aging of the industry is off the charts. The average age of commercial beekeepers, the ones who travel and do all this work, is well into the 60s, and rising quickly. There is simply no margin in beekeeping at this level to entice new growth. Those exiting the industry far outpace new entrants. While at the same time, as we lose native pollinators, the demand for our services continues to rise.

Here is where it gets interesting. In row crop agriculture there are roughly 1.9 million farmers nationwide. In commercial beekeeping that number is less than 2000, and the number responsible for most of the commercial pollination is much closer to 1000. A recent offer to buy out much of the industry, by a company called GeoCure, highlighted that issue. Within 60 days, 138 people, representing 1.3 million of our estimated 2 million migratory hives, were seeking offers.

Think about that: The majority of our nation’s pollination is in the hands of fewer than 200 people. These people are going broke, selling out, and advising their kids to go elsewhere. Most of these operators are in their upper 60s and have no replacement plans or options with the current economics.

This age problem will result in lower output and higher produce and food crops nationwide in the next 5-8 years.

As such we are requesting an industry-specific allocation similar to ECAP. We would ask for $500 million to be set aside for emergency relief. This would provide funding for 2-3 seasons, allowing us time to establish a longer-term solution.

• Payments of $85 per hive to go to FSA-complaint beekeepers, until funds are depleted.
• Hive count to be based on average of high and low count for the season starting March 1.
• Recipients would have to show gross income of $135 per unit from bee-related sales
• No more than 10% annual growth
• Review board to be made up of beekeepers
• Any claim over 200k would require in yard inspection.
• Producers eligible for UPLIFT are not eligible for ELAP in the same year.

Reasoning

While there are several programs out available, such as ELAP, rainfall, honey loan, or specialty crop (honey again) none of these effectively target apiculture. Many pollinators do not produce much honey, and a program to help honey prices does not help in a short crop situation such as we face often. Rainfall insurance does not cover excessive rainfall, which for beekeepers may be as bad as short rainfall. All of the programs are attempts to cover shortages in the industry, and do little for the average commercial beekeeper.

For ECAP 2025 7.3 billion was spent, spread across roughly 44 thousand operations which means an average payout of 165,00 per operation.

At 75$ a hive* 3 million hives which is almost all the hives in the US, it would be 225 million a year. We expect the number to be closer to 2 million since we have added income requirements to the mix. When we use 2000 beekeepers as our number, that dollar average of 112,500 per operation at the 3 million mark, even with no AGI limitations. We believe this works within the averages of row crop farmers. Given the extremely difficult nature of our work in comparison we feel it is only reasonable.

At 85$ a hive* 3 million hives which is almost all the hives in the US, it would be 255 million a year. We expect the number to be closer to 2 million since we have added income requirements to the mix. When we use 2000 beekeepers as our number, that dollar average of 127,500 per operation at the 3 million mark, even with no AGI limitations. We believe this works within the averages of row crop farmers. Given the extremely difficult nature of our work in comparison we feel it is only reasonable.

At anything over 75$ a hive, as long as your losses do not exceed 80% your incentivized to keep then healthy. Once the 80% is reached ELAP is a better choice. This incentive is a positive one.

It is also our current understanding that ELAP payout numbers are currently over 80 million and climbing. A new proposed change reduces our average loss to 14% which will increase the payouts dramatically, add in elimination of AGI and we start to approach numbers for losses that are close to what we would ask for live hives.

We feel a program than incentivizes success and is paid out to successful beekeepers at the same rate as less successful ones is the correct long term answer for our industry.