ZAGREB, 21 April 2022 - The government will provide financial assistance to beekeepers in Međimurje after the mass death of bees, Agriculture Minister Marija Vučković said on Thursday after a government session.

She recalled that the government had helped local beekeepers after the scourge of bees in 2020 when about 40 honey farmers were given 1,300 bee colonies and the aid was worth HRK 1 million.

Vučković said that now the authorities were waiting for the findings of a veterinary inspection to establish whether the mass death was caused by a contagious disease or if the bees were killed by the effects of the use of protective chemical agents. Recently, an estimated 17.5 million bees in about 350 beehives in Međimurje have been found poisoned.

Local apiarists say that the wrong application of protective agents in fruit growing as well as in rapeseed cultivation has led to the mass poisoning of bees.

For more, check out our politics section.

April the 19th, 2022 - Medjimurje bees, as well as those living in Podravina and Slavonski Gorje, have been dying en masse and causing great concern as to the reason why.

As Poslovni Dnevnik writes, millions of dead Medjimurje bees, as well as bees from Podravina and Slavonski Gorje, are a massive cause for worry. For some reason, ten entire bee hives are full of dead inhabitants in the apiary near Prelog alone, where 700,000 bees flew away, presumed dead.

Bees dying in their millions across the Republic of Croatia are making many suspicious, as some farmers are either behind the times and treat their future crops with insecticide without realising the damage they're causing, or simply don't care that they're harming bees at all. Insecticides kill bees in great numbers and there are some farmers who have evidently been living under rocks and who are unaware that if there are no bees, there are no crops to be sold or a living to be made either.

''Bees don't die at home, they go away to die. A bee won't die at home if it can go somewhere else,'' one worried Croatian beekeeper told Dnevnik Nova TV.

Two years ago, 57 million bees were killed, and the culprit was never identified. Although an investigation by the State Inspectorate is currently underway, the exact cause of this is unknown. Nobody knows what went on exactly, and they won't until the situation is properly determined,'' said Nervin Grabant, a concerned beekeeper from Prelog.

"We've seen great damage from the death of Medjimurje bees, which still remained on the agricultural land," said Zdenko Radikovic from Sveti Kriz. “Some farmers are spraying the fields in broad daylight. They should be sprayed two weeks before flowering, but they're late and they just spray them when part of the rapeseed starts to bloom, which is when the bees are present and doing their jobs,'' he added.

Beekeepers have avoided public appearances in order not to lose any customers, but now, with the deaths of millions of Medjimurje bees, they unfortunately have nothing to lose now, as even having honey to sell in the first place is being called into question.

For more, make sure to check out our lifestyle section.