An Irish company has unveiled plans to tackle the dramatic decline of the bee population.

Beemune claims its natural feed product can help save millions of pollinators from potentially deadly infections which threaten global food production.

The firm, a spin-off from the National University of Maynooth in Co Kildare, hopes to tap into the multi- million pound commercial bee industry which has sprung up as a result of the falling number of honeybees. “The population decline is a major problem. If bees don't pollinate crops we will lose 40% of world food production,” Beemune's chief scientific officer Dr Kevin Kavanagh said. “For many people bees mean honey, but if people look in their fruit bowl all of that fruit has been pollinated by bees.”

Dr Kavanagh said the company's food ingredients would improve the nutrition of bees and help them survive the stresses of modern farming.