Save the Bees, Bats and Butterflies! How Rotary International Is Making Pollinators a Priority

Bees, butterflies, bats, beetles, birds, moths and other insects may be tiny creatures, but their work is no small matter. They are all pollinators, and they’re a big deal in terms of the world’s global food production, clean air and economy.

Biting into a crisp apple isn’t possible without the work of the fruit’s main pollinators — honeybees, mason bees and bumblebees. Celebrating with a shot of tequila is out, too, without bats, the only animal that pollinates the agave plant. Even a juicy steak depends upon agricultural pollinators like butterflies to fertilize the flowering plants cows consume.

Yet today, one-third of the food on America’s plates is at risk, as factors like temperature extremes from climate change, farming practices, habitat loss and increased levels of herbicide wreak havoc on symbiotic ecosystems.

And the problem is global. The fertilization process pollinators carry out increases the output of 87 of the leading food crops worldwide, from cocoa to coffee, plus plant-based medicines.

Dwindling bee populations are grabbing headlines, but the danger extends to all pollinators. According to Dr. Chris Stein, rotarian and chief of National Heritage Areas and Partnerships for the National Parks Service, more than 85% of the planet’s plant species need insect pollination to reproduce. “Yet very sadly, in just the past 50 years, pollinators have declined by more than 40% worldwide.”

The situation carries great financial consequences. The U.S. Department of Agriculture reports that honey bee pollination alone adds more than $18 billion in value to agricultural crops daily, and forms the basis of the entire U.S. economy. Pollinators contribute roughly a half-billion dollars a year to global food production, according to researchers from Ohio State.

Given the stakes, it’s remarkable that philanthropy lacks visible leadership on the issue. An exception may be a new and growing program launched and funded by Rotary International (RI) and the Rotary Foundation that makes pollinators a priority.

A new focus area

Rotary International typically tackles big causes that have the capacity for global impact, from expanding access to quality care for mothers and children to providing local solutions for clean water and hygiene. Its work fighting life-threatening disease has had a measurable impact on the trajectory of malaria and HIV/AIDS, and includes a decades-long commitment to eradicating polio that’s contributed to a 99.9% drop in numbers.

Rotary’s 1.4 million members provide leadership when it comes to solving the problems that the service organization and its foundation prioritize. The number of programs the organization supports recently increased from six to seven. In June of 2020, Rotary International’s board of directors and foundation trustees made protecting the environment a new area of focus, based in part on input from a member alliance, RI’s Environmental Sustainability Rotary Action Group (ESRAG).

Though it’s still early days, Rotary Foundation Environmental Global Grants in 2021 totaled $1.9 million. That increased to $3.3 million in 2022, for a total of more than $5 million. Rotary Foundation is a public charity that had $330 million in overall expenditures during fiscal year 2022, with funding coming from large and small donors, along with investment returns from both its annual fund and a $623 million endowment.

Keith Madden, manager of the Environmental Area for the Rotary Foundation and Rotary International, said the investments are currently an “amalgam of things based on how projects came into being.” One example is the $100,000 grant it made this year to engage 10% of the local community in supporting urban environmental restoration in New York’s Hudson Valley. Another $59,000 grant made in March provided purple crow butterfly habitat conservation and ecology education around the northwest coast of Taiwan.

Overall, Madden sees “quite a broad mix of projects, a largely decentralized cumulative effort — though some revolve around ecologically resilient watershed management.” Members also drive organizational support for on-the-ground initiatives, through Operation Pollination.

Operation Pollination

Dr. Chris Stein said Operation Pollination was created to be part of the solution to pollinator conservation. An official initiative since last year, its projects and framework hinge upon the interests of members and clubs around the globe. There’s no “one-size-fits-all” mindset regarding which projects are developed and implemented, explained Stein. They’re driven solely by interest, capability and capacity.

Rotary district grants are generally no larger than $10,000, support various initiatives. A grant of roughly $6,000, for example, helps protect monarch butterflies in Western Mexico, including the reforestation of nearly 4,000 trees in the El Rosario Sanctuary in Michoacán.

The projects have three steps. The first is a pledge to conduct a voluntary, collaborative action that can be as simple as handing out seeds to students or planting milkweed, which North American monarch butterflies feed upon exclusively.

The second is to engage an array of partners, including local government, nonprofits and other clubs. For example, schools are a natural partner for educational programming toward raising the profile of pollinator issues, while government, community groups and nonprofits are all good partners for projects that work to restore habitats. Members also promote the actions of citizen scientists on projects like identifying a nectar corridor for migratory and nonmigratory species.

The third step is leveraging member and partner resources to raise awareness of the work.

Overall, the goal is to create an “interconnected mosaic” of habitats across public and private land that will be developed to build and stabilize pollen-producing plant life.

An issue without borders

Though pollinators exist in a world without borders, global and national efforts are essential to solving the crisis. In the past decade, they’ve begun to put pollinators on the radar.

In 2016, the United Nations recognized pollinators’ role in ensuring food security. So have governments like the U.S., whose first national initiative to protect pollinators dates back to the Obama administration. The European Union recently boosted action on the pollinator objectives it set for 2030, and the Asian Pollinator Initiatives Alliance (APIA) built a regional network to raise awareness and action that’s garnered support from the World Wildlife Federation Thailand, and the Earth Net Foundation.

Numerous nonprofits also prioritize pollinators, like the Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation, which has seen an uptick in support over time. "We've seen individual giving greatly increase over the last 20 years, well above the industry standard. This really speaks to how much people care about pollinators and other important invertebrates,” said Executive Director Scott Hoffman Black.

Climate change can seem like a hard thing for a donor or nonprofit to tackle, an almost existential crisis that feels beyond the reach of ordinary citizens. But in pollinators, Rotary sees a very human solution to a human-made problem.

Stein said that since last September, 60 Rotary Districts and 160 Clubs around the world have officially joined the environmental framework representing five continents, and countries from Australia to Portugal and East Africa.

He expects that to grow in scale in the years ahead. “If they are all working on some type of pollinator project, that can add up to be a sizeable contribution toward pollinator conservation,” Stein said.

Then he quoted Margaret Mead: “Never underestimate the power of a small group of committed citizens to change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.”

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