Question: What do cities like Atlanta, Chicago, Portland, Paris, San Francisco, Seattle, Toronto, and Vancouver have that NYC does not?
Answer: Legalized beekeeping.
Bee keeping is currently illegal in New York City. The New York City Health Code under Section 161.01 prohibits the possession, keeping, harboring and selling of "wild animals." This ban, in it's listing of "all venomous insects" includes and in doing so outlaws bees..
Action Alerts
Honeybees are garden heroes! Honeybees help gardens grow more fruit and vegetables and produce sweet honey. They are nature's best pollinators and contribute to productive harvests in community gardens, public parks and nature centers.
In order to improve the health and well-being of our urban environment and populace,
Just Food, a non-profit organization that works to develop a just and sustainable food system in the New York City region, proposes that honeybees be removed or exempted from Health Code 161.01. is circulating a petition to legalize beekeeping in NYC.
You do not have to "bee" a resident.
To sign online, go to
Online petition - Legalize Beekeeping in NYC!For fact sheet, continue reading:
Bee keeping is currently illegal in New York City. The New York City Health Code under Section 161.01 prohibits the possession, keeping, harboring and selling of "wild animals." This ban, in it's listing of "all venomous insects" includes and in doing so outlaws bees. Honeybees are garden heroes! Honeybees help gardens grow more fruit and vegetables and produce sweet honey. They are nature's best pollinators and contribute to productive harvests in community gardens, public parks and nature centers.
This fact sheet highlights the many benefits of honeybees, outlines legal beekeeping initiatives in other cities, addresses questions about the dangers of honeybees, and proposes that the New York City Department of Health amend its code, and thereby lifts its ban on beekeeping.
Beekeeping Benefits Public, Economic and Environmental Health
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Local Food Production: Honeybees are pollinators and pollination is essential to maintaining and increasing the productivity of NYC's community gardens, botanical gardens and public parks.
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Small Business/Economic Development: One colony of bees can yield anywhere between 30-150 pounds of honey, as well as honeycomb, beeswax, pollen and royal jelly for sale. With a retail value of at least $10-$12 per pound, honey sales can contribute significantly to a beekeeper's supplemental income. Beekeeper cities such as San Francisco, Savannah and Chicago are forming small business enterprises that feature honey along with value-added products (lotions, balms, soaps).
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Job/Youth Training: Beekeeping programs across the country provide job skills and training to youth and the unemployed in production, sales, marketing and management.
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Education: Beekeeping provides a rare opportunity for urban school children to connect with how and where food is produced. The United States Department of Agriculture and North American Pollinator Protection Campaign have a curriculum to teach children the importance of pollinators.
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Health/Nutrition: Pollination is critical to the success of agricultural crops grown in NYC's 600+ community gardens and urban farms, which create increased access to healthy produce in many of the City's low resource neighborhoods. Honey gives energy, is antibacterial and rich in vitamins and minerals, many of which are antioxidants that help prevent cancer, heart disease, and strokes. Additionally, local honey contains small amounts of pollen from local plants, and has helped individuals build immunity to these pollens and aid in alleviating allergies.
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Biodiversity: As pollinators, honeybees contribute to the production of fruits, vegetables, and seeds. In turn, they further contribute to the health and biodiversity of an urban environment by providing a food source for birds and other insects.
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Increased safety: Beekeeping is happening in NYC and is permitted by the State Apiary Policy. There is already an inspector assigned to monitor hives in NYC. Legalization will increase registration and inspection with the New York Department of Agriculture and Markets and allow for the open adoption of widely used guidelines for beekeeping.
Beekeeping Success in Other Cities Many cities permit and regulate urban beekeeping and have found that urban apiculture can benefit human, economic, and environmental health. In Chicago, the City Hall and Chicago Cultural Center has six well-kept hives on their rooftops as an element of their City's aggressive greening initiative. Value-added products from these hives are sold at local markets and national chains such as Whole Foods, and they have created an employment program which uses urban beekeeping to create jobs for low-income residents and formerly incarcerated individuals to teach job skills in production, sales, management and marketing. San Francisco has included beekeeping in public spaces as part of its "Plan for a Sustainable City," and has set a goal of five percent of all city honey consumption be produced in San Francisco.
Safety Stings are the most common concern about honeybees. However, honeybees are not aggressive by nature and are unlikely to sting. Only 0.4% of Americans report an allergy to insect stings in the U.S., and relatively few of these are caused by honeybees. In addition, less than 1% of the US population is at risk of systemic reaction to stings by honeybees. Severe reactions from the sting of any one insect in a year are 1 in 5,555,556. The chance that someone will be hit by a car is 59.3% higher.
Honeybees in Crisis The survival of honeybees is currently at risk. In the winter 2006-2007, an average colony loss of 38% was reported by U.S. beekeepers. Many of these losses were linked to Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD), which has become such a serious issue that Senate passed the Pollinator Habitat Protection Act of 2007, which was co-sponsored by Senator Clinton and designates pollinator protection as a "national priority resource concern." The Pollinator Protection Act of 2007 also stresses the important role that pollinators, especially honeybees, play in pollinating many important U.S. crops. Communities around the country need to be a part of the solution and encourage apiculture to mitigate the spread of CCD, including New York City!
A Proposal for Change In order to improve the health and well-being of our urban environment and populace, Just Food proposes that honeybees be removed or exempted from Health Code 161.01.
Just Food, with experience organizing communities around food production in NYC, is prepared to implement an urban beekeeping program which will include training, guidelines for beekeeping and the provision of emergency sting kits. We will provide resources, educational materials and will help beekeepers to take advantage of the free hive registration and inspection process that already exists with the state Department of Agriculture and Markets. Just Food will support community gardens and institutions that have expressed a desire to keep bees, promote safe and responsible beekeeping practices, and encourage the development of profitable and beneficial beekeeping operations throughout