How much cost would artificial pollination add to common products (fruits etc.)?

Question

I've read about ecosystem services and their possible valuation - statements like "honeybee pollination service in the US is worth 1.6 billion dollars".

Is data available on how this would affect the cost a consumer pays for a given product? For example if the humans must do all pollination of fruits themselves, how would that affect the retail cost of these fruit?

Answer 1

The cost would increase; either because pollination services are not provided and the supply is decreased; or because the cost to producers goes up as they must pay for artificial pollination. See the extremely detailed analysis in Winfree et al.

edit

I imagine what you're actually asking for is a $ figure "per apple". This depends on the location, crop, market, etc., but just for a ballpark, if I'm reading the supplementary tables in Allsop et al correctly, the replacement value of insect pollination to apples in the Western Cape of South Africa would represent a 6%-25% increase in production cost (and, if the producers pass that along to the consumers, an equal increase in the cost to consumer).

• Allsopp MH, de Lange WJ, Veldtman R. 2008. Valuing insect pollination services with cost of replacement. PLoS ONE 3: e3128–e3128.
• Winfree, Gross, Kremen. 2011. Valuing pollination services to agriculture. Ecol Econ 71: 9–9. [behind paywall, but posted free here]