Pollination is a keystone process in both human-managed and natural terrestrial ecosystems. It is critical for food production and human livelihoods, and directly links wild ecosystems with agricultural production systems. The vast majority of flowering plant species only produce seeds if animal pollinators move pollen from the anthers to the stigmas of their flowers. Without this service, many interconnected species and processes functioning within an ecosystem would collapse. With well over 200,000 flowering plant species dependent on pollination from over 100,000 other species, pollination is critical to the overall maintenance of biodiversity in many senses. Animal pollinators allow many kinds of flowering plants to coexist in an ecosystem, rather than restricting it to the lower-diversity stands of wind-pollinated plants that dominated before the flowering plants evolved. Pollination services thus shape plant communities and determine fruit and seed availability, providing tremendously important food and habitat resources for other animals.

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