Not to mention rock art of honey collection from bees dating back to 7000BC in Spain.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_honey_bee#Domesticat...
How does that compare to intensive agriculture and pesticides? Seems like the honeybees impact would be marginal then?
In general pesticides and habitat loss have more serious impacts, but when you've got a stressed ecosystem adding honeybees that deplete resources from native pollinators is adding to the harm. The bees are pollinating even when they're taking nectar as well, so they're not all bad. But at the same time endangered native bees are put further at risk by honeybees.
However there are places where there is intensive beekeeping (like for almond production in California, I remember having seen a documentary) and that seems to be a completely different level.
And then there are places in China where they pollinate manually because all the insects die due to the pesticides, and that would be another extreme.
Not trying to make a point, just trying to understand if there is a point where "artisanal beekeeping" is fine or if it is always bad.
Does this effect matter in comparison to other things? Maybe, it depends on the ecosystem and local context. I haven't made any normative statements, just pointed out a fact. If I were to offer a normative opinion, it's that beekeepers should be aware of the effects of their beekeeping and try to be responsible, not keeping hives in areas where they would have an undesirable effect on the pollinators of an ecosystems that's vulnerable.
In my country, I have heard beekeepers saying that we don't want too many hives because they compete with each other and with other pollinators. It is controlled to some extent, so there is the intention, but I don't know if it's based on something scientific or just intuition.
If there were studies about the impact of honeybees, I would be interested, that's all. Because it is true that I have always considered that the main problem is habitat loss and pesticides.