Aside from their role as food, insects perform a plethora of other vital services in ecosystems. For example, 87% of all plant species require animal pollination, most of it delivered by insects. The colourful petals, scent and nectar of flowers evolved to attract pollinators. Without pollination, wild flowers would not set seed, and most would eventually disappear. There would be no cornflowers or poppies, foxgloves or forget-me-nots. But an absence of pollinators would have a far more devastating ecological impact than just the loss of wild flowers. Approximately three-quarters of the crop types we grow also require pollination by insects, and if the bulk of plant species could no longer set seed and died out, then every community on land would be profoundly altered and impoverished, given that plants are the basis of every food chain.

The importance of insects is often justified in terms of the ecosystem services they provide, which can be ascribed a monetary value. Pollination alone is estimated to be worth between $235bn and $577bn a year worldwide (these calculations aren’t very accurate, hence the wide difference between the two figures). Financial aspects aside, we could not possibly feed the growing global human population without pollinators. We could produce enough calories to keep us all alive, since wind-pollinated crops such as wheat, barley, rice and maize comprise the bulk of our food, but living exclusively on a diet of bread, rice and porridge would quickly see us succumb to deficiencies of essential vitamins and minerals. Imagine a diet without strawberries, chilli peppers, apples, cucumbers, cherries, blackcurrants, pumpkins, tomatoes, coffee, raspberries, courgettes, runner beans and blueberries, to name just a few. The world already produces fewer fruit and vegetables than would be needed if everybody on the planet were to have a healthy diet. Without pollinators it would be impossible to produce anywhere near the “five a day” fruit and veg we all need.