Cyclone damage shows New Zealand’s beekeepers are unprepared for climate change
Thousands of hives in remote areas still unreachable and full scale of devastation remains unknown
Two months after a cyclone swept away thousands of beehives in the fertile fruit bowl of New Zealand’s North Island and left thousands more unreachable, beekeepers are facing a painful and costly recovery that has prompted questions of how they will adapt to the intensifying climate crisis.
When Cyclone Gabrielle roared across the North Island in February, killing 11 people and wreaking billions of dollars in damage, it tore apart the orchards and vineyards of Hawke’s Bay and the East Coast – where pip fruit, kiwifruit and wine are export earners – and destroyed 5,000 to 6,000 of the beehives that pollinate them. It represented “severity and damage that … has not been experienced in a generation”, the prime minister, Chris Hipkins, said.
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