In Bologna, there is a significant presence of environmentally oriented persons handing out literature opposing presence of chemicals in the food supply. With the presence of Varroa in Italy, the risk that pesticide will somehow get into bee products has become very real. As one might imagine, Italian beekeeping is also intensive. The largest beekeeper in the country has less than two thousand colonies, according to my latest information. Many beekeepers are producing single floral source honey.
Apiaries are as immaculate as the orchards of fruit trees seen almost everywhere.
A small apiary outside Bologna is characteristic. It consists of a neat double row of colonies painted a uniform robin's egg blue. There is movement of colonies by truck, but little to rival the kind seen in Florida when bees are moved to the orange and later to the midwest. Most bee flora in Italy is cultivated as opposed to the U.S. where the majority is wild. This contributes to the problem of pesticide poisoning.