Honey bee colonies are an essential provider of ecosystem services, and are among the most important productive animals worldwide. Unacceptable losses of managed western honey bee Apis mellifera colonies have been observed in many countries. It becameapparent that countries cannot easily solve this problem individually, and that there was an urgent need to address the lack of comparable data on rising colony loss rates among and between different countries. As a result, in 2008 COLOSS (the prevention of honey bee COlony LOSSes network) was initiated, funded by the European Union COST Programme (Action FA0803) (2008-2012). After 2012, COLOSS was consolidated into an international, non-profit association headquartered in Bern, Switzerland, funded by:the Ricola Foundation Nature & Culture (the main sponsor); the Eva Crane Trust; Veto-Pharma; IBRA (International Bee Research Association), the University of Bern; and many local sponsors for individual events (Brodschneider et al. 2022).COLOSS is composed of scientific professionals that include researchers, veterinarians, agriculture extension specialists and students. However, members cannot be involved in producing substances that are harmful to bees. To date, COLOSS has 1,857 members from 105 countries, and is still growing (Fig. 1).
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