Startup wants to train bees to pollinate coffee with greater precision

Just like dogs, bees can be trained to perform sniffing tasks, such as accurately recognizing the fragrance of agricultural crops of economic interest, such as coffee (Coffea arabica), and thus pollinating them more effectively. This is because these pollinating insects have the ability to develop olfactory memory, associating the environment where they collect pollen and nectar from flowers that serve them as food with their smell, explains ecologist João Marcelo Robazzi.

“Bees use signals, such as color and fragrance, to find and, consequently, pollinate flowers. These signals can be used to train them in the laboratory so that they can more easily recognize target agricultural crops when their colonies are released into crops and carry out pollination more efficiently”, says the researcher, a specialist in bee training.

Based on these findings, corroborated during his doctorate in ecology at the State University of Campinas (Unicamp) and in neurosciences at the Université Paul Sabatier, in Toulouse, France, Robazzi founded in partnership with Marcela Barbosa, doctor in entomology at the University of São Paulo de Ribeirão Preto (USP), and Maria Imaculada Zucchi, professor at Unicamp and researcher at the São Paulo Agency for Agribusiness Technology (APTA), Polo Piracicaba, a startup, called PollinTech, aimed at improving the precision of coffee pollination by Africanized bees ( Apis mellifera), through odor.

“The objective of this odor-guided pollination strategy is to increase not only productivity but also the quality of coffee beans,” explains Robazzi.

To train bees, researchers have developed a the project supported by FAPESP's Innovative Research in Small Business Program (PIPE), synthetic biomolecules, obtained from mixtures of artificial odors, which are perceived by pollinating insects as the natural floral aroma of coffee.

By synthesizing and training bees with these biomolecules that imitate the odor of the coffee flower, researchers hope to achieve an increase of more than 18% in bean production.

“We have already developed a solution that imitates the fragrance of the coffee flower, as perceived by bees. This will allow us to train them in the laboratory so that they can more easily find this target crop in the field and, with this, the pollination rate can be increased and, consequently, the coffee production and the quality of the fruits”, says Robazzi.

Preliminary results from laboratory experiments indicated that the bees did not perceive differences between the synthetic solution and the natural aroma of the coffee flower.

“The bees identified our mixture as the scent of the natural flower. By being exposed to this synthetic biomolecule in the laboratory, they will know what smell to look for when they are released into the field. This way, pollination events should be greater”, says Barbosa.

Studies conducted in other countries have shown that bees, when trained with synthetic products, increase sunflower production by 57%.

Low awareness of importance

According to data from the Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES), around 90% of agricultural crops produced around the world depend, to some degree, on pollinators. Bees are responsible for pollinating 75% of all plants cultivated and used directly or indirectly throughout the world.

In Brazil, the value of pollination for food production is estimated at R$43 billion annually. Of the 191 agricultural crops grown in the country used for food, 114 depend on the action of pollinators, with coffee representing 12% of this value (R$ 5,6 billion) (read more).

“Studies indicate that pollinators increase coffee production, on average, by 18%. This is reflected not only in the quantity, but also in the quality of the fruits generated and the final product. Some studies show that pollination can also increase some sensory characteristics of the drink”, says Barbosa.

Despite these benefits, researchers found when participating in the 22nd PIPE Program in High Technology Entrepreneurship (PIPE Empreendedor) that Brazilian coffee farmers still do not know or understand the role of pollination in coffee production.

“We believe that, in the future, the commercialization of the solution we developed must involve raising awareness and learning on the part of our customers about the importance of pollination in coffee farming”, says Robazzi.

Interviews with potential customers to assess business viability carried out during the training also indicated that specialty coffee producers are initially most interested in the solution.

“We see the specialty coffee segment as an initial market, although our technology is scalable for other producers, especially those who are making the transition to regenerative agriculture,” said Barbosa during a lecture at the end of the 22nd edition of the training, on 7 from December.

The researchers' idea now is to test the solution in the field and expand its application to other crops of agricultural importance, such as oranges, avocados and açaí.

The presentations of startups participating in the 22nd PIPE Program in High Technology Entrepreneurship can be watched here.