Use of Apis mellifera Honey to Predict Heavy Metal Loads in African Fruit Crops? – A Proof of Concept

Introduction The use of insects and their products as indicators of toxic substances is an established approach (Mercuri & Porrini, 1991; Codreanu et al., 2009; Rashed et al., 2009; Skorbiłowicz et al., 2018; Rothman et al., 2019 & 2020; Kaste et al., 2021). In fact, some cases of anthropogenic pollution would not have been successfully traced without the use of insects to identify artificial sources of its origin (Porrini et al., 2003). Furthermore, due to the constant threat of global warming and climate change, there is an ever-increasing demand to employ the services of insects as bioindicators because they are inextricably linked to the ecosystem they belong to and could reveal even the smallest changes occurring around them (Skorbiłowicz et al., 2018). Insects are even well recognized for their roles in showing toxicity due to agricultural usage of pesticides (Kavanagh et al., 2021). The presence or absence of insects on food crops could play key roles in saving lives from acute toxicity; the former indicating safe to eat while the latter, a warning sign of imminent danger due to the absence of insect life on it (Soldano et al., 2016). This indicates that the knowledge of the use of insects as bioindicators has great implications for saving human lives by preventing the consumption of toxic food grains.