SPAS-Serbian Pollinator Advice Strategy

Project aim: The SPAS project deals with monitoring the status and trend of pollinating insects (wild bees, bumblebees, butterflies and salt flies) in Serbia, raising awareness of the importance of pollinators and providing advice on improving the ecosystem pollination service on which food quality and crop yield depend.

 

About the project: Pollinator decline significantly affects the ecosystem’s functioning, as this disrupts the pollination process necessary for the reproduction of many plants, including cultivated species used in human and domestic animal nutrition. In order to gain insight into the status, trend, the abundance and diversity of wild insect pollinators in Serbia, the SPAS project aims to monitor wild bees, bumblebees, butterflies and hoverflies, as well as plant species they visit. Following the protocol of the European Pollinator Monitoring Scheme (EUPoMS), the method of line transect and tri-colored pan traps is used at 30 locations in Serbia, three times per year (spring, summer, autumn). In order to detect the factors that most affect insect pollinators and later on to define measures to be taken to eliminate or reduce the causes of pollinator decline, various environmental variables (e.g. weather conditions, soil type, predatory birds, honey bees as competitors, flower cover), as well as the use of pesticides and changes in land use are monitored. In addition, in order to implement adequate measures for the protection of wild insect pollinators, specifics and differences at the gene level within and among different pollinator species are determined. Also, data necessary for estimating the economic value of the ecosystem pollination service are collected, based on which the value of pollination at the national level is determined.

It is important to emphasize that no national initiative or strategy for pollinator conservation has been established in Serbia so far, and that the SPAS project will provide a relevant database with systematically collected data using EUPoMS protocols and thus support the European Pollinator Initiative and strategies, with the ultimate goal of preserving biodiversity.